


Led Home

by letsgogetlost



Category: Downton Abbey
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Blind Character, Canon Disabled Character, Fix-It, M/M, References to Suicide, Slow Build, Some Spoilers for Series 2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-04
Updated: 2013-09-08
Packaged: 2017-11-13 17:22:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 22,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/505906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/letsgogetlost/pseuds/letsgogetlost
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Thomas Barrow gives into a weakness, a need to say goodbye, a great deal changes, starting with the saving of a life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The World's Wound

**Author's Note:**

> The work and chapter titles come from the "Love is Enough" 'songs' of William Morris's 1873 _Love is Enough; or, The Freeing of Pharamond, a morality_.

“No!” he hissed, his voice slicing through the thick darkness of the night. His hands were quick, reprimanding, grasping, checking - finding the information he needed. “What’re y’doing? No.” The skin of his hand slid against warm wetness and gripped, his fingers pressing so tight that that other man gasped. It was his gloved hand that found the razor; he dropped it to the floor, with a metallic click that made his bones ache. He bent close to inspect the cut in the dim light from the nurses’ station’s night lamp. It was deep, purposeful, and he pressed his hand against it again. “What are you doing?” he hissed, swallowing the accent of his surprise, before he became aware of the shaking of bed, the gasp for air - he was crying, the other man. Thomas ignored it, his free hand finding a towel hanging from the nightstand, wrapping it around the wound. Were the others around them awake? Surely someone had noticed the commotion by now, in that place where everyone was aware of every little shift in breath or mood. “What were you thinking?” he asked, before anyone else could come.

Edward said nothing, but then he was upon Thomas, who briefly thought to fight him off, push him away - but he was not fighting, he was sobbing, pressed into the rough wool of Thomas’s uniform jacket, and Thomas suddenly felt very much like crying, too, and cursed his weakness, all his weaknesses. A light flashed at the end of the room, a nurse approached with lit lamp in hand. “Corporal Barrow?” she inquired, and her voice was soft, unsure. It was not Nurse Crawley, and to Thomas’s surprise he wished it were. “What is it?” But even as she asked it, she saw the darkness of the blood on the sheets, on Lieutenant Courtenay’s skin, on Thomas’s hands, and she gasped. “I’ll fetch Major Clarkson.”

“No."

She stopped and stared down at Thomas, who was supporting Edward; the injured man had gone silent, head down - maybe fainted, from her perspective, but Thomas could feel him waiting, his breath soft and slow, now, no longer crying.

“There’s no point waking half the hospital,” Thomas said. “It’s not bad. Bring me some bandages and we’ll let Major Clarkson see to him in the morning."

He was her superior; she might not agree with his decision, and he might catch hell for it in the morning, but she obeyed his command, returning quickly with a roll of linen. She hovered as he eased Edward back down, out of his embrace; he wished she wouldn’t. Edward stayed silent, his face averted, as Thomas bound his arm, pulling the linen so tight that he must know that Thomas was enraged by this display, what he did and what he tried to do. When Thomas tucked in the last end of the bandage he let out an instinctive “There, that’ll do,” and the soldier grabbed at him, managed to find a hand, the left, in its glove; he pressed it so hard it hurt, and Thomas bit back a curse.

“You won’t leave me?”

“I won’t,” Thomas replied, gingerly pulling his hand away; Edward let him go. He looked up at the nurse. “You can go. You must have other duties.”

She looked at him a bit askance; it was not his shift, he was meant to be asleep, this was outside his duties, and she was not, he has noticed, the type to understand that sometimes one wants to, or must, work outside one’s assigned tasks. But she could take an order - she would have made an excellent soldier, he thought - and she went, leaving the lamp burning on the nightstand. When she was gone from the ward, Thomas blew the lamp out, then settled on the low stool beside the bed, where he had been sitting, quite often, since the next bed, his old seat, was taken by a man with a bullet in his shoulder a few days before.

“There now,” he said. “We’re alone and you’re patched up. Would you care to tell me what you’re on about?”

Edward snuffled slightly and rubbed at his eyes, not out of sadness, but embarrassment, Thomas thought. Something in the movement, flexing his arm or touching his eyes, hurt Edward, and he grimaced. “I don’t want to go,” he said.

“I know, but that’s no reason -”

“It is.”

There was a silence.

“What did I tell you?” Thomas asked, his voice sharp, harder; sympathy was not working out.

“When?"

“When I read you the letter about your brother.”

Edward paused. “Not to let them make me a victim.”

“And what,” Thomas spat, keeping his voice low, but not empty of venom. “Could make you more of a victim than letting it kill you?”

“Thomas -” There was a silence. It is the first time Edward had used his Christian name since the day he learned it. Thomas did not correct him - Edward could call him anything he damn well pleased. Edward took a breath before continuing. “I’m not like you. You must see that. I’m not strong. I just -” his breath caught; he was trying not to cry again, and not entirely succeeding. Thomas, without thought, reached out and grasped his hand. It was the first time he had touched Edward without some professional reason to do it, bandages to change, guidance to provide. Edward paused, and sniffled, tears at bay again, for the moment.

“You are strong,” Thomas said. “I know it’s hard and it’s lonely and it’s sad but you are. And you’re going to to go off to convalesce - no, you are, I don’t want them to send you away any more than you want to go, but they will send you, there’s no helping that - but you will be strong and get stronger, and then you’ll go home and give that brother of yours what for, won’t you? Because men like him, like Major Clarkson,” like Carson and the Earl of Grantham and all the rest, “they can’t win, can they? We can’t let them win.”

Edward shook his head, but then nodded, and gripped Thomas’s hand harder. “I’ve been happy here, sometimes,” he said. “I’m not often happy.”

Thomas could tell that. Even without that night, he could tell that. “Nor am I,” he answered. Another silence fell, and Thomas shifted on the stool. “It will make me glad,” he said slowly, trying the words in his mind as he found them, “If I can know that you’ll leave this place determined to be happier.”

“No one can promise that.”

“No, but one can try.”

Edward was quiet, but then he nodded. “I owe it to you, and Nurse Crawley, don’t I.”

“You don’t owe anyone anything.”

“No… but I can want to.” He squeezed Thomas’s hand again; Thomas had forgotten they were holding hands, and although the warmth of it and the knowledge of it gave him a soft sort of happiness, after he squeezed back he took his hand away. Even in the protection of the dark, that was not a good thing to do, not the sort of thing to let anyone see. “And you?” Edward asked.

“And me what?”

“What will you do? After this. If there is ever an after this.”

Thomas shook his head. “I don’t know. But I do know it will be better.”

“It’s always something better with you, isn’t it?”

“It is. It can be for anyone, if they’d not let themselves be stepped on.”

Edward nodded again, but said nothing for quite some time. He seemed tired, and rightfully so, Thomas thought. He would be exhausted in the morning when the transport came for him and the other convalescents, and his arm would hurt him something awful for a while. But that was better than being dead. When Edward yawned, Thomas blinked, coming back into his mind, his duties.

“Lie down,” Thomas said. “You should sleep.”

“You’ll stay?”

“Yes.”

Edward nodded and lay down, but started, almost up to sitting, when Thomas grabbed his shoulder, grasping at it with a sudden violence that was so unlike his usual, studied motion.

“Promise me you’ll not do it again.”

Edward took a gulp of air; Thomas had frightened him, but he wasn’t sorry, not after what Edward had done. “Thomas -”

“No. Swear it.”

“I swear, I swear - oh, God, I’m so sorry-” Thomas relaxed his grip, then touched the young man’s back, moving so quickly from anger to comfort, relaxing his body towards the other man’s, hovering close, but not embracing him, no matter how much he wanted to.

“None of that. Just - don’t do it again.” If he did, Thomas wouldn’t be there to save him. If he hadn’t wanted so desperately, so sentimentally, so foolishly to say goodbye, he wouldn’t have been there this time, either. He released Edward’s hand. “Go to sleep. I’ll stay here.” He’d be in trouble for it in the morning, but damn the rules, damn the matron and Major Clarkson, damn them all to hell.

 

In the morning the transport came, and everything was as it should have been, and Thomas was there to help Edward in with the rest of the ambulatory men. Edward clutched at his hand as he guided him into the van, then leaned so close that his curling hair brushed against Thomas’s temple. “Thank you, Thomas,” he said, and squeezed the uniformed arm the supported him.

“You’re welcome, sir,” Thomas replied, as though he was only being thanked for a moment of aid.

 

When the transport pulled away, Thomas stood and watched from the hospital gate. He wasn’t alone, several of the nurses clustered there, too, but his were the eyes trained on that one form, the bowed head and quiet stillness of Lieutenant Courtenay. He had looked so insignificant, sat there with the other men, awash in khaki, clutching his stick and his little bag of things, which Thomas had packed very carefully early that morning.

From a distance, he had looked unscathed. The bandages on his arm were hidden by the cuff of his uniform, which he had buttoned with such purposeful fingers, an edge of grim determination, tugging at the fabric until weakness, the desperate all-consuming sadness, of the night before was as well hidden as its effects. His eyes did not even look clouded from afar, just as they did not look blue, unless you were close, close enough for hands to brush or whispers to be heard. Even the blistering of his skin faded to nothingness within a few paces, and as the van pulled away, he was whole in Thomas’s eyes, nothing to distinguish him, just another soldier among the multitudes, and that, truly, was the strangest, most painful thing of the last day. He was perfect. Thomas did not expect he would ever see him again.


	2. Through the Trouble and Tangle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A familiar figure appears on the front drive of the new convalescent hospital at Downton Abbey.

Month followed month with little to say for themselves. There was a scandal over Edward’s near-suicide, more of one than Thomas had expected. Edward may have been only one more minor officer, but he had been liked by the powerful - the truly powerful, not just the conniving - and Sybil, to her credit, raised a mighty stink, which was in turn taken up by Mrs. Crawley, always in search of a cause. So Downton Abbey became a convalescent hospital, and Thomas saw his opportunity. He took great joy in that, in lording his power over Carson and the others when he was made manager of the place. He’d never wanted to come back there, until the war; certainly never wanted to dine in that servant’s hall again, never wanted to be in service. This was better. He got Downton, and he got power, which was the greatest savour in his life.

There was never another like Edward. There was no room for any feelings, and none to elicit them. Not a single face to draw his eye, not a voice he wanted to hear, a sour mood he wanted to cheer; all was back to normal. The comfort of the familiar and the joy of true power were all he needed. Those, and the letters. They were brief and infrequent, and his responses were the same, but those little notes that were sometimes handed to him by whoever was delivering the mail, always scribbled in one unfamiliar hand or another, told him that Edward was alive and “as well as can be expected,” that was what they always said. As well as can be expected. That was all one could ask for, truly. Or all Thomas thought he might ask for.

 

The letters stopped coming when Edward was discharged., and that worried Thomas, though he’d not acknowledge how the anxiety of it sat in the back of his mind, picking and prodding at him when he was not distracted enough. He anticipated the arrival of the post, watched with sharp eyes for anything addressed to him, but nothing came, not for weeks - no relief. And when that relief did finally some, in was in a most unexpected way.

Thomas was in the middle of his work day, sorting out what would be needed for a new arrival of convalescents, when Lady Edith came to fetch him. “There’s someone asking for you at the door, Sergeant Barrow,” she said, all that well-trained politeness on display. He loved the sound of them acknowledging his position. He was expecting no calls, but he could be wanted for any number of things; messages from the hospital, deliveries. When he saw who the visitor - his visitor - was, though, he stopped dead in the entry hall. Even dressed in his civvies, his form was unmistakable; Thomas had thought of him so often and now there he was, standing alone on the gravel drive, face lit by the late summer sun, turned slightly towards it, soaking in its warmth, waiting. Thomas stepped out into the sunlight, feet crunching down onto the drive, crossing the few paces to the other man, who listened to him come - Thomas could tell by the tilt of his head. “Lieutenant Courtenay.” 

Edward turned towards him, and smiled.

“Corporal Barrow - or, no, I hear you’re a sergeant now.”

“Acting sergeant.”

“You didn’t mention that,” Edward said, still smiling - teasing, even? He had never been one to joke.

“Didn’t seem important.”

Edward shook his head. “Well, I’m pleased for you, Sergeant Barrow.” He held out his hand; Thomas closed the small gap between them, and they shook.

“What brings you to Downton, then?” Thomas asked, hearing the tightness in his own voice, though he was trying to be casual about this, this sudden appearance.

“Just a social call. After all the bustle of the hospitals I’ve been going mad at home.”

A silence formed between them, resting awkwardly on that statement. Going mad. It could be casual, it likely was, but they both knew what it rang of, in Thomas’s ears.

The silence was mercifully broken by a soft “Oh!” from the porch. Thomas turned; it was Lady Sybil, already rushing across the gravel towards them. “Lieutenant Courtenay,” she said as she reached them. “What a nice surprise. It’s -”

“Nurse Crawley,” Edward interrupted. “I know.” He held out his hand, and she grasped it.

“You must stop a while, what even brings you here?”

“Just thought I’d pay a visit to an old haunt, now that I’ve been discharged.”

“Well, lovely,” Sybil said. “I’m so glad to see you doing so well - but I must get back to my duties - will you stay for supper?”

Edward shook his head. “My mother will be expecting me, I’m afraid.” Thomas looked at them both. Such perfectly polite creatures, raised just right, filled with all the proper words, the proper way of saying anything, and in the proper accent. How could anyone ever tell what people were really trying to say, when they talked like that?

“Oh, well, I am sorry, but - I have to go.”

“It’s perfectly all right, I’ll just chat with Sergeant Barrow and be on my way - that is, unless I’m inconveniencing you?” he inquired, turning to Thomas.

“No, no,” he answered. “Nothing I couldn’t do later.” Edward gratified that with a smile, and Sybil smiled, too. Not Thomas; not even a ghost of one, it was not the sort of thing he would allow himself before he knew where he truly stood in all this.

“That’s wonderful,” Sybil said. “You must tell your driver to go around, I’m sure Mrs. Patmore will be glad to fix him a cup of tea while he waits.”

“Thank you, I will.”

“It’s lovely to see you again.”

“And you.”

She left them, then, rushing back inside. She did always seem so full of ideas of what she could be doing, always from one duty to the next.

“A grand reunion,” Thomas mused.

“Rather,” Edward answered him. And there it was again, that smile. It was a rare thing, once; it had only been common in those last weeks at the Downton Hospital, when Thomas and Sybil devoted all their free time to Edward and the three of them had, so briefly, been inseparable.

“Would you like a tour of the place, then?” Thomas asked. “It’s not much different from any other stately pile turned convalescent home, I imagine - not much room at the moment, we’re full up. I could possibly get us some tea.”

“I was hoping we could walk,” Edward said. “I’ve been in the motor all morning and it does make me want to move about, stretch my legs.”

“All right. Where to?”

“Anywhere. You lead the way.”

Thomas nodded. “Come on, then.” He held out his arm, and Edward found it, running his fingers along the rough wool of the uniform jacket to place his hand halfway up Thomas’s forearm, not holding him, really, just resting there. They’d never done it like that, back at the hospital, not exactly. When Edward had first got up on his feet, Thomas had wrapped an arm around his waist to guide him, hold him up; he’d been weak, from the trauma of his injury and the fevers they caught in the field hospitals. Then when he and Sybil had started helping Edward, training him, Thomas had held onto his arm, not the other way around, steadying him while allowing him to find his way on his own - that had been the point. This was different. This was Edward asking for guidance, but not in need of training, steady on his feet. He’d improved, in the time he’d been gone, but not changed - not at all. Everything about him was familiar; every detail of his face, every movement of his body, even his scent. The way his smile shifted when he spoke. The feeling of his body so close as they began to walk.

 

After Edward spoke to his driver they walked out into the park, away from the house and is bustling fullness, its many occupants and all their inquisitive eyes and ears. The more time Thomas could spend away from any of them, the better. 

Thomas didn’t have much use for the manicured lawns and garden temples, but he did like a bit of woods, places you could be alone, and he knew where was best to go on that estate. They turned from the grass into the forest; one would hardly have known there was a path there, but it made itself known among the carefully planted shrubbery, if you knew where to look.

Thomas had been silent as they crossed the lawn, but now he paused, just inside the edge of the woods, and his voice came out muffled among the dark, slick leaves of the bushes around them. “There are roots here,” he said, turning to the other man, and watching as Edward deftly swung his stick down to evaluate the ground before him, then brushed at one of the shrubs with the back of his hand, sending several long since wilted blossoms drifting into the leaves. He turned his hand, felt one of the leaves. 

“Rhododendron?” Edward asked, turning his head slightly.

“If you say so.”

“Not a plantsman, then.”

“No.” There wasn’t much call for it, in Leeds.

“Where are you taking me, then?”

“I know a place - down by the lake. It’s nicer than their treasured Capability Brown lawns.”

“Oh, is it a Brown?”

“It is - would you prefer that?”

“No,” Edward said, with a quirk of a smile. “Do with me what you will.”

Thomas smiled. He held more smiles for this man who could not see them than for anyone else, except possibly O’Brien - and that was an entirely different sort of thing. Those smile weren’t nearly so kind, or happy. He led on.

 

It was slower going, along the path, with its bumps and turns, its steady slope towards the water in places slick with damp and fallen leaves and blossoms. Edward, using his stick as Thomas and Sybil had taught him, still quickly lost his footing, and grabbed at Thomas’s leading arm even as Thomas caught him with his free hand. Edward laughed, but with a frown. 

“All right?” Thomas asked.

“I’m fine,” Edward said, though he was flushed - embarrassed, Thomas recognized the look. “Just not so strong on uneven ground. What’s here, what did I slip on?

Thomas looked around. “Oh, I don’t know - mud, rocks, leaves - I shouldn’t’ve brought you this way.”

“No,” Edward said, his voice short. “It’s fine. Let’s keep going. Just - tell me what to do.”

So they went on, Thomas pointing out things every few steps, all the small obstacles he usually plunged past, uncaring, without a concern. It took some time, but it worked; Edward did not slip again. When they reached the lake Thomas helped Edward find the fallen log he always used as his seat, then sat beside him, and lit a cigarette, and looked at him, this other man there beside him. Edward’s cheeks were still flushed, but he was smiling slightly, the edges of his mouth in the smallest upturn. “Could I?” he asked after a moment, reaching a hand towards Thomas.

Thomas handed over the cigarette, the tips of their fingers dancing together as Edward took it, a bit awkwardly. “I thought you didn’t smoke,” Thomas said. “Or I’d’ve offered you one.”

“I don’t, anymore. Or I’m not meant to,” Edward replied, taking a short drag, then holding the cigarette towards Thomas again, exhaling the smoke in a puff, almost a ring. “They were afraid it might make me worse, after the gas.”

“Rightly so.”

“I know.”

There was a silence. Thomas watched his smoke curling off towards the water, rather than stare at the other man. Even if Edward didn’t know when he was doing it, it still seemed wrong.

“So you’re the boss of the big house now,” Edward said after a moment.

“In a way. Just of the hospital, and I have Major Clarkson to answer to. Old Carson’s still got control of anything to do with the family.”

“How long since they made it a hospital?”

“Six months, give or take. All thanks to you, you know.”

Edward turned towards him. “Oh?”

“Nurse Crawly got all in a tizzy after you-”

“She knew?”

“I think everyone did. There was blood to be cleaned up, and the nurse who came - word gets around in a place like that. And she saw me arguing with Major Clarkson, too.”

“About what?”

“About him almost getting you killed.” Thomas ground out the cigarette, reducing it to a little ball of paper and ash. That whole episode still enraged him.

Edward’s eyebrows drew together slightly. Part of him blamed Clarkson, too, though he’d been the one with the razor that night. “Then maybe it’s thanks to you.”

“Downton Abbey opening to convalescents? Na, that was all Nurse Crawley, and Mrs. Crawley, once she got wind of it. I could be as upset as I wanted, but I’m not Clarkson’s superior in rank or class, so it wouldn’t get a damned thing done. Those two have weight to throw around. They have the house. They’re the ones that arranged it.”

“I suppose I should be pleased that I put that in motion,” Edward said, but he did not sound pleased. Thomas said nothing. “But, truthfully, I’m embarrassed. That’s why I didn’t ask to come back, when I heard they’d done it. I couldn’t face Clarkson, he gave me such a dressing down.”

“He’s a prick,” Thomas spat.

Edward shook his head. “He is. But he’s just doing his job.”

Thomas scoffed, and stared at the lake for a time. “So what brings you back now?”

Edward shifted, ran his fingers around the top of his stick. “I missed it. I was happy here. And - I hoped to find you. I feel as though I never thanked you for what you did for me - not just that night, but the whole time I was there.”

“I was only doing my duty.”

Edward reached out suddenly, and clutched his knee. “No. You weren’t. I noticed. You weren’t like that to any other man there. You’re good to them, but you were my friend. My only friend. You still are.”

Thomas looked straight at him for the first time since they had come down the path. Edward was flushed again, and blinking hard, pale eyes disappearing again and again under scarred eyelids. “It was my pleasure,” he said, his voice low and even. Edward nodded and turned his face away, leaving Thomas to look at the curling hair above his ear, the spiderweb of injured skin that stretched towards his temple. “Who’s been shaving you?” he asked after a moment.

Edward turned back. “Me, today. Why, have I missed some?” he asked, his fingers brushing along his cheek.

“No, but you’ve got all kinds of little cuts.” Mostly along the jawline, but one near his lip, too - mostly healed. Hardly noticeable.

“Oh. Yes. That’s primarily my own handiwork. Sometimes our butler Bland does it for me, but he’s no better, he’s not young, and between the shaking hands and the myopia -”

Thomas shook his head. He’d expected Edward would have a man. But butlers did valets’ duties, often enough, and there were so few men available, anymore - and when you could find them, what a mess they were. “How is it, being at home?”

It was Edward’s turn to scoff; Thomas frowned slightly. He’d assumed Edward would be glad, all the men ever wanted was to go home. But then, Edward was always different, wasn’t he. “Awful. I’m so bored, and I just sit and think all the time -” he paused, rearranging what he was talking about. “My mother alternately coddles me and ignores me. She won’t let me go out on the land, she hardly likes me walking in the garden on my own. It took the best part of the last three weeks to convince her to let me come here. But she has all her things she does, all her volunteering for the war effort, so mostly it is just me and Bland, and he’s no great company. Almost makes me wish Jack hadn’t been called up, at least them I’d have him to argue with.”

“I’ll visit you,” Thomas said, the words tumbling out from him as though they had life of their own. What was it about this man that made him say things without thinking? “If you’d like,” he added, as though that eased the impulsivity of it all.

“Truly?” Edward asked, turning to him again. “You don’t have too many duties here?”

“I have days off. Is it hard to get from here to there?”

“No, it’s just outside Harrogate. There’s a bus, but mother wouldn’t hear of me taking it.” His hand was pressing into the bark of the tree trunk; Thomas could see his knuckles go white with the tightness of the grip. They were both nervous, weren’t they. “It would be nice,” Edward added. “I’d like it. If you can.”

“Then I will.”


	3. The Plains Are Not Empty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thomas pays the promised visit.

When Edward left Downton that day, he gave Thomas careful, exact directions to his home, the perfectly remembered details of a lifetime of walking from the small village north of Harrogate to his childhood home, but with that small addendum - “That is, if nothing has changed.” 

 

When Thomas did visit, two weeks later, he found that the directions were perfect, but hardly necessary. The house was not a hard place to find, as long as you knew to look for a set of slightly worn pillars, marking out a drive where it passed through the hedgerow along the village road. The walk showed a fine landscape peeking from beyond the trees lining the estate's drive, the Dales rising in the distance, farmland filling the valley.

The house was set not far from the road, atop a hill among pines, and it was small - or, smaller than Thomas had expected, more alike to the dower house or even the Crawleys' house in the village than to Downton Abbey - but it was a fine home, Thomas had seen enough of them to know that.

He came to the front door, knowing it was his right, that here no one would even question that. He straightened the hem of his tunic though it was never crooked and knocked, and was answered by an elderly, dark-suited man - the butler, no doubt about that - who said he was expected and led him to a sunlit sitting room.

 

Edward had been sitting by the window, toying with a pen he'd come across on a tabletop, but when Thomas and the butler entered, he stood.

“Sergeant Barrow, sir.”

“Thank you, Bland,” Edward said, with all the stiffness of any master of the house. He listened to the butler leave before smiling in his friend’s direction. “Thomas - I’m so glad you’ve come.”

“Well,” Thomas replied, aware he was not so quick to smile as Edward, and also aware Edward couldn’t tell. “I said I would, didn't I?” He was not a person who paid calls, and he stood stiffly, as though at attention, his uniform suddenly too warm in the unseasonable heat.

“Please, sit,” Edward smiled, gesturing towards a settee in the middle of the room before sitting himself, his hand easily finding the red upholstery. Thomas did as he was told, perching beside him, back very straight. “How was your journey?”

“Easy. It’s a fine day.”

Edward nodded. “What do you think of the homeplace, then?”

“It’s very nice,” Thomas said, almost adding a ‘sir’ from habit, catching it in time.

“It must seem very different to Downton Abbey- I told Mother I’d been and she said it was quite a grand house.”

“It is, I suppose. More house than any family could even need.”

“What is it like?”

“Oh, big - monstrous, really. Even at shooting parties we don’t fill it. It’s like -” It was so strange, to have had Edward there, right on the doorstep of the place, and to know he knew nothing of it. “Here,” he said, and reached out to touch Edward's hand. Edward let him take it without asking his intentions, though his eyebrows wrinkled slightly. Thomas turned his hand, resting it on his own gloved fingers. Edward's palm was very soft and pale, none of the marks and calluses of a worker, only one Thomas recognized as being the mark of a shooter, still not worn down - or maybe exacerbated - by time in the trenches.“Big and square,” Thomas said, tracing the silhouette of the building on Edward's skin, “With four small towers on the corners, and a tall one in the middle. All pointed like an old church, but much newer.”

“Ah,” Edward said, as though he understood it all from Thomas’s brief description. There was the smallest pause before their hands separated. “It sounds impressive.”

Thomas nodded slightly, without much conviction. “It’s all right.”

“You worked there before the war.”

“First footman.”

Edward nodded and was silent for a moment, and Thomas felt the difference between them drawing out like a string pulled too taunt. One would not have imagined them, heir and footman, sharing a couch like this. Touching hands, even for that brief moment. “How have you been, then?” Edward asked, and Thomas watched his fingers tighten on the couch’s arm, slightly - this was more difficult, somehow, than their visit at Downton Abbey, stranger.

“Well enough. Busy.”

“I hope I’m not taking you away from things you want to be doing.”

“No - you’re not.” There was nowhere else he wanted to be, and he’d made sure to get any necessary tasks done or relegated before he left for the day. 

“And you? How are you?”

“Bored,” Edward said. “Always bored.”

“Hopefully I won’t contribute to that.”

“No - you’re the only exciting thing in my life.” The words came out fast - he was on the verge of being upset, Thomas knew the tone, the tightness of his jaw, the slope of his eyebrows. He remembered all of it.

“I wouldn’t say I was exciting.” He almost added another sir, and hated the word for hanging there, reminding him where he truly belonged - not perched here on some fine sofa, but blacking boots or pouring wine, or saluting in the field. Edward frowned, which made Thomas sorry. “Would you like to do anything?” he asked. “I could read to you, we could walk.”

“A walk would be nice,” Edward said, with an exhalation, a visible relief, his mood easing. “I’d like to go down by the fields - the wheat must almost be ready for harvest.”

Thomas nodded. He’d not know about that, but he’d go wherever Edward wanted. “You know the way?”

“Of course.”

“Good, otherwise I’d get us lost and we’d end up in Harrogate. Or Hull.” 

Edward shook his head. “Just down the hill, save your adventures for another time.” He stood up. He was steadier now, stronger than he had been. Maybe more confident, now that he was in a familiar place. “Come on then. We’ll have a bit of the blind leading the lost.”

Thomas smiled a little and stood. “All right.”

Edward found him and took his arm, and they took a step towards the room’s open French windows before Edward stopped again, pulling Thomas up short. “Oh - my stick.”

“Where is it?”

“I don’t remember.”

Thomas’s eyes darted around the room and found it lying beside the chair where Edward had been sitting when he came in. “I see it. Shall I fetch it?”

“Please.”

He stepped away from Edward but kept an eye on him, considering him, seeing a hint there of the more helpless, hopeless, unhappy man he’d known in the hospital. Another Edward had taken over, one accustomed to his place in the world, but the first was still there, under the surface, as he must have always been; it took one to know one, maybe, and Thomas could see - had seen, months ago - that Edward had been dissatisfied, less than happy, lost, maybe, long before any of this had happened.

He returned, and Edward held out his hand; Thomas gave him the stick, and offered him his elbow, and they passed out onto the terrace without comment.

 

A wide, sloping path among the trees led them to the edge of the estate’s farmland. A stone wall rose between them and the fields, which were high with wheat. They stopped there, Thomas standing, almost to attention, Edward slightly ahead of him, running his hand along the rough top of the wall, touching moss and stone. “How does it look?” he asked after a moment of silence, of listening to the wind in the trees and the wheat stalks.

“What?” Thomas asked, stepping forward as well, ready.

“The field. Is the wheat - I assume it’s wheat - grown high?”

“I wouldn’t know. I suppose it is wheat. What qualifies as high?”

Edward laughed under his breath. “You are a city boy, aren’t you?”

“I am.”

“I’ll have to find out for myself, then. There’s a stile to our right, maybe 100 yards, after the oak - the big tree,” he added, with a smile. He was poking fun. Thomas ignored it. He knew what an oak was, and he saw where Edward meant, but didn’t start moving.

“There’s a man there, under the tree.”

“I suppose it will be a farmhand,” Edward said, without concern. “Take me there?”

As they approached, the man took notice, and stood up straight, watching them come. When they were close, he doffed his cap. He was, as Edward had said, obviously a worker. His hands were dirty and his clothes worn, but he looked strong, if old - certainly too old to be working the fields, but then, there were no young men to do it, now. Thomas saw his eyes on him, briefly, reading him fast and hard like those men always did, with suspicion there, the suspicion Thomas knew from the slums - insular people met with a stranger. It made Thomas bristle, but it was over as quickly as it had come, and the man was smiling at Edward. “Mr. Courtenay, sir,” he said.

Edward nodded in greeting. “Hello.” His hand slid from Thomas’s arm, and suddenly he was very much his own man, very much lord of the manor. Thomas took a step back.

“It’s Harry Yates, sir,” the man said, shaking Edward’s hand in both of his. “I’d heard you were back -”

Edward smiled. “Of course, Mr. Yates, how are you?”

“Well enough, sir.”

“Will it be a good harvest, do you expect?”

“Very good, sir. The wheat’s high for the season. Good weather. We’ve been lucky.”

“Wonderful. And how is it with the rest of the land, do you know?”

“Good, where it’s planted. Some’ve had trouble, not enough men to work the fields, these days.”

Edward nodded, and frowned slightly, suddenly more serious, more grave. “And your sons?”

“Tommy’s still here, sir, on account of his foot, but he works as good as any man. Albert’s over there - France.”

“Keeping safe, I hope.”

“Oh, yes, sir. The wife and I just had a letter yesterday. It’s been quiet where they are.”

“Very good.”

There was a pause, and the farmer looked out over the field, then back at Edward, and once more at Thomas. “We was glad to hear you were back, sir, it is nice to see you out and about.”

“Thank you, Mr. Yates. It’s good to be back. I missed it here.” The farmer only nodded. “Say hello to your wife for me. I’ll be waiting for news of the harvest.”

“Of course, Mr. Courtenay, sir.”

Edward reached out, and immediately found Thomas’s arm as he moved close again. “Back up the hill then, I think,” Edward said. 

Thomas could feel the farmer’s gaze on their backs until they reached the trees; only when they reached the cool of the shade and he felt alone again did he speak. “Learn all you wanted to know?”

“Yes. Thank you for taking me down.”

“You know a lot about it, don’t you? The crops and all that.”

“I make it my job to know. A landowner should know his business, though you’d hardly think it, the way some men carry on - but then, it’s not my business anymore.”

“It is if you don’t let them take it from you.”

“Yes - well. That’s a bridge to be crossed when we get to it, isn’t it. For now I’d just be happy if the manager would meet with me.”

“He won’t? Have you asked?”

“No. He should come on his own, he should have come as soon as I was back.”

“Well, if he’s not, then tell him. You are the lord of the manor, aren’t you?”

Edward smiled. “It’s hardly a manor.”

“You know what I mean.”

“I do.”

 

When they returned to the house, they sat somewhat more comfortably in the parlor, and Thomas read from the newspaper. Edward had a pile of them at least a week old, but with his mother away on war relief business, he had no one to read them to him - and, he said, she never wanted to read him the real news anyway, stories of the path of the war or the state of affairs in Britain.

Bland brought tea, and Thomas poured it carefully, and the afternoon stretched on until, very suddenly, it had gone five and he had to leave, had to rush back to the center of the village to board the bus for Ripon. He stood and so did Edward, and they clasped hands, and Thomas wondered, briefly, how much Edward knew. Had he been aware of how Thomas watched him, reading his expressions, judging his recovery, and whether he still struggled? Or of how Thomas's skin tightened whenever their bodies met, just a bit, just enough that he was conscious of it, of being touched. He had never much liked bring touched, but he had found, in the hospital and now, that he did not mind, from Edward. Touch was such a part of Edward's life, his hands glossing against furniture and walls to find his way, fingers running across teacups and newspapers, and Thomas was part of that life, somehow, though he still could hardly believe it when Edward held his arm and walked beside him, or spoke his name and smiled. His very existence seemed somehow exceptional. 

It was hard for Thomas to leave - to do back to Downton, all the things that place held for him, and to leave Edward, who for all his new confidence seemed unhappy that Thomas was going, though he said nothing, just held then dropped Thomas's hand, and unsuccessfully fought back one of his frowns.

"Until next month," Thomas said.

"Next month," Edward responded, and raised a hand as Thomas left the room, waving at his footsteps - and Thomas raised a hand in return, because it seemed strange not to.


	4. The Hills Be Held Shadows

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Even in friendship, there are things that are hidden, or never discussed.

Through the late autumn and the winter, all of Thomas’s visits were essentially the same as the first. He got one day off every fortnight; every second day off, a Tuesday in the middle of the month, every month, he went to see Edward. He could never stay as long as he wanted - it took the better part of the morning to reach Harrogate and then get out to the house, and he would arrive back in Downton in the evening, after taking the last bus of the afternoon, and he would often go without supper rather than asking Mrs. Patmore if she had anything she could heat up for him. At first, it was all a bit strange; Thomas was not used to having the sort of person in his life that he would just go to visit - not used to having much of anything like a friend - and Edward was not much used to having other people around, besides the butler, and his usually-absent mother. They quickly fell into a routine, however, and they would eat together, and walk, in almost all weathers, and read. Edward wanted to hear the newspapers, or poetry. He was not much of one for novels, and when his mother was there and did read to him, novels were all he got. Thomas did not think much of the poetry, at first, but soon he was borrowing volumes from Downton’s library, slipping them from their shelves with his thief’s hands when no one else was about, and carrying them to Harrogate and back. More significant than the reading, or the walking, though, there was the talking - talking was what they were really together for, what Edward wanted most of all. Edward had managed to make the manager come speak with him, at Thomas’s urging, and he kept up with the reports from the fields, the harvest and the lambing. Thomas listened carefully to him when he related the reports, though they meant nothing to him, because he enjoyed hearing Edward’s interest and occasional excitement. Edward spoke of others, things, too: stories of school and university, of his family - mostly complaints about his brother - but not about the war, neither of them talked much about the war. He wanted Thomas to talk, too, and so Thomas did. He told Edward little of his work, though that was what occupied his time between visits; he didn’t much like talking about it, or even thinking about it, truly - visiting Edward was his escape from all that, from Downton and from the everyday of work and intrigue and all the rest. Instead he spoke of other things, when Edward asked: stories of the time at Downton before the war, as long as they did not paint him in a poor light; gossip and things he had read in the newspapers and, increasingly, in books Edward insisted he borrow; and, sometimes, about his life before Downton, because Edward was more curious about that than anything, and his desire to be told outweighed even Thomas’s deepest reluctance to talk about it, about Leeds, about anything that had come before uniforms and dinner service and the perfect posture and silent movement of servants and soldiers.

There were those who noticed Thomas’s absences, on those days off. The servants and the hospital workers knew he went further afield on one of his days off than the other, and did not return until late, and they may have wondered where he went - and Mrs. Patmore even asked, once - but they knew well enough that they would get no answer. Edith, watching him walk down the front drive early one morning, commented on it to Sybil, wondering where Thomas got off to, those days, as he’d never gone farther than the village on his days off before, and she’d even seen him disembarking from a bus one evening. Sybil acted as though she had not noticed, too, as though she did not have her own ideas of where he might be going, and said she did not know, and did not much think it any of their business. Only O’Brien, however, noticed the change in him as well as in his routine. Thomas Barrow had always been one of the hardest men she had ever known, and he surely still was, day-to-day, sarcastic and mean and scheming as always, but something had shifted in him, in his aspect, in the frequency of his hardness and the look of his eye. He was distracted by something - they all were. But with him, it wasn’t sadness - she would have sworn, if she had not known better, that he had found a thing that gave him happiness. She was so harshly rebuffed the only time she asked where he went, however, that she did not try again, knowing that there was no point in it, and that she was right - Thomas had never had much of a capacity for happiness.

 

It was March before anything changed. That month, Thomas visited twice, first on his usual Tuesday, but then again, on the last Wednesday before April. He had his reasons - he told himself it was simply because he did not have anything to do on his other day off, but that was usually the case. What truly drew him back was Edward, a difference in him.

Edward’s brother Jack came home on leave, briefly, in February, and afterwards, even into March, Edward was moody; there was still no love lost between those two. It did not help, either, that Jck, though several years younger, had surpassed him and reached the rank of captain. He was, Thomas surmised, the man of action of two, and Edward the intellectual, the gentleman farmer, but their differences did not keep them from rivalry; such things rarely did. And having him home meant Edward had to face, again, the fact that Jack wanted control of the land, felt it was no longer Edward’s ability - or place - to manage the business of the estate, despite it being the only thing Edward had ever really wanted. Jack was more ambitious, and while Thomas could not with any personal honesty fault that trait in any man, he still hated Jack, without ever having met him, because of how he made Edward feel, the unhappiness and anger that came to the surface because of him. And it was not only Jack’s visit that drew Thomas back - it was also a suspicion that all was not as well with Edward as he made it seem. There had only been little hints of it, in clenched fists and continual, if very small, dishevelments, in moments of being utterly lost, even in familiar rooms, in sighs of contentment that implied a previous malcontent, in passing confessions of boredom and frustration, in the way he sometimes grabbed at Thomas’s knee or arm like a drowning man.

And so, Thomas returned, unannounced - he only made the decision the night before, and there was no time to send a telegram. He did not have to worry about Edward not being there, so he hoped only that he would no interrupt anything, or find Edward’s mother there - he had no inclination to see anyone but Edward when he visited, and even Bland most often seemed an intrusive figure.

 

Bland seemed surprised to see Thomas when he presented himself at the door that morning, and greeted him not with his usual curt nod but with a “Should we have been expecting you?”

Thomas shook his head and shifted his feet, until he was standing like the soldier he still was. “No. Just dropping in.”

“Mr. Courtenay may not be ready to accept visitors,” Bland replied, but he ushered him inside nonetheless, and disappeared upstairs, leaving Thomas standing straight and still on the hall rug, sucking on the insides of his cheeks, waiting and not admitting to himself that he was worrying. It was almost time for lunch, an odd time for someone to be upstairs, to not be receiving visitors - he didn’t understand.

Bland reappeared quickly, and nodded for Thomas to follow him, showing him to Edward’s bedroom - and then Thomas understood. Edward was standing at the window, the weak spring sunlight on his unshaven face, still wrapped in his dressing gown despite the lateness of the morning. His bedclothes were still disheveled, and the breakfast tray on the bedside table did not look like it had been touched. Thomas got the feeling that he had only just gotten out of bed.

“Sergeant Barrow, sir,” Bland announced.

“Thank you, Bland.” The butler bowed slightly and was gone. “Thomas -” Edward said, and there was something in his voice that made Thomas frown, more than he had been already, wavering somewhere between anger and concern. He wanted to step forward, but he did not. “What brings you?”

“I’d nothing to do with myself today. I thought you might like some company.”

“Well, yes. Always.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t send word. I seem to have disturbed you.” His words were not coming out quite as he wanted them too. They were too hard. “Are you quite well?”

“Of course,” Edward replied, and his voice was hard, too, words short. He turned to face Thomas fully. “Why do you ask?” It was not curiosity, it was a challenge, and it only made Thomas want to reach out to him more. 

When Thomas spoke again, his voice had softened. “It’s only that you’re a bit of a mess.” Edward ran an hand over his beard - several day’s worth of growth, at least. He frowned, but said nothing. “Are you usually like this, when I’m not visiting?” Thomas asked, aware that he sounded like a schoolteacher, one of those who knew the guilt of his student but liked to prod, to get a confession.

Edward was silent for a moment, his frown only deepening. “Yes.” He fumbled for the chair behind him, then sat down with a thump, legs stuck out in front of him like an adolescent. “What does it matter?”

Thomas finally took a step towards him, then stopped himself. “Well. I don’t like to think that you aren’t being taken care of - taking care of yourself,” he amended, seeing the dark look that crossed Edward’s brow. “You’re unhappy,” he added, his voice growing quieter in the room, which felt too close, and yet too empty.

“Of course I am.”

“You don’t act this way when I visit.”

“I’m not unhappy when you visit.” 

He said it all like it was so obvious, such a given. That he was miserable, that Thomas visiting made him less miserable - but that was not what he had been showing Thomas. He had been hiding it, and part of Thomas was furious with him for it. He stayed silent for a long time, so long that Edward left off his frowning, and turned to where he had been standing. “Thomas?”

“Yes?” he replied, pursing his lips. He still was not sure what he was to say, how he was to respond, whether the annoyance he felt was the way to react, to best way to solve this. Sometimes it was, with Edward.

“I thought you might’ve gone.”

“No,” Thomas said, and the annoyance did not emerge. Now was not the time. “I’m here.”

“I’d like to get dressed.”

“All right. Would you like to shave, too?”

“Not particularly.”

“Are you sure?”

Edward huffed. “If you’re so worried about it, you do it.”

“I can, if you like.”

Edward’s expression softened slightly, his eyebrows arching. “Truly?”

“Of course. Would you like me to?”

“You shouldn’t - I’m no longer in your care.”

“I want to.”

Edward considered this, and ran a hand over his patchy stubble again. “All right, then.”

 

Edward had his own bath, which looked like it had been converted from a dressing room only in the last decade. Before that, it would have been a washtub in front of the fire, Thomas assumed - just like him, growing up, though Edward likely had not had to share a washtub with his whole family, one lukewarm bath full of the dirt of the kitchen and the streets, the clockmaker's grease and the grime of the pub.

Thomas prepared all the shaving things quickly, brush and soap lined up on the marble edge of the sink, razor honed with a few sharp flicks. He knew this task as well as any, as well as holding a tray at dinner or preparing a lord for the hunt. He had never been denied the role of a valet as a result of his skills - there was never a question of him being good at what he put his mind to, only of him being allowed. When it came time to lather Edward’s face, however, he paused, looking at the young man perched before him on a little ladder-backed chair.

He took a deep breath. “Ready?”

Edward nodded, and Thomas did, too. Ready as he would ever be.

It was the first time he had touched Edward’s face since the hospital, and it was strange to him. Edward’s eyes had cleared a little, they were no longer so angry-looking, so pained, but the scars were the same, spreading out across his delicate, almost translucent skin. The stubble was new, though - Thomas never would have allowed that to happen in the hospital - and there was something new in Edward’s expression. He had always frowned, when he was being looked after in the hospital. Now he didn’t, but Thomas was not sure what to read in the frozen anticipation of his ministrations, and looked down to the shaving soap in his hand.

Thomas was very gentle with Edward, but efficient. He slowed only when he reached Edward’s temples, because there the blade of the razor got dangerously close to Edward’s injuries. He could feel Edward’s own anxiety there in the shortening of his breath, and he used caution, holding his own breath in, too.

When he was done, he stepped back. “You can rinse.” Edward stood and splashed water on his face, then accepted the towel Thomas pushed softly against his arm, drying off before running his fingers across his jaw and cheeks. “That’s the best shave I’ve had in months,” he said. “You could be a barber. How are you with hair?” He touched the curls behind his ear when he said it - his hair was getting a bit long. 

Thomas shook his head. “Not as good as with shaving. I’d make you look a fright, I’m sure.”

Edward shrugged. “I’d not know the difference, it hardly matters.”

“It matters to me.”

Edward turned his head sharply, focusing his empty gaze on Thomas. “Why? Why do you care so much?”

“Because you’re my friend,” Thomas said, keeping his voice even as though it were the most unexceptional thing in the world, and as though it was exactly what he was thinking, and not _Because I love you_ , not that at all. “And I have few enough of those, so it’s best to look after the ones I’ve got.” As though there were more - as though there was anyone but Edward.

Edward nodded and turned away. Apparently that answer was good enough. Thomas let out a tiny puff of air and began to put away the shaving things.

 

After being asked, Thomas helped Edward choose his clothes for the day, pushing his hands lightly into the wardrobe and finding the full range of things needed by a well-dressed country gentleman - far more pieces than Thomas owned, or ever expected to, possibly more even than Lord Grantham. Edward must have been quite fashionable, when he was in uni. There were gaudy bits in there that certainly spoke of studenthood. Thomas selected something everyday, though, the kind of tweeds that would be good if they walked later, and laid them out on the bed. Edward did not ask him to go while he dressed, and so he didn’t, instead lingering by the window and talking about the weather, making it clear that he was not facing Edward, though out of the corner of his eye he did watch Edward’s light fingers as he aligned buttons and made sure his hems were even, his slightly pursed lips as he tied his boots.

Over luncheon, they read the newspaper, Thomas snapping each page to attention and reading it between bites, and Edward listening quietly, as he most often did - he was too polite, raised too well, to interrupt, make snide comments, not like Thomas. It wasn’t until they were settled in the sitting room that Edward had much to say, but that wasn’t so unusual for him - he had his periods of silence, and so did Thomas, and they did not begrudge them of each other.

“It’s been almost a year since I met you,” Edward declared, without preamble, as Thomas settled himself on the settee beside him.

“That’s true,” Thomas replied, keeping his voice toneless. The closeness of the date to the time Edward had been wounded had been the other deciding factor in Thomas’s visit, but he would not state that - it seemed almost invasive, as though he was too concerned with Edward’s life. As though he was as concerned with it as he truly was. 

Edward was silent for what seemed like several minutes, leaving Thomas wondering where this might be going. Usually Edward danced around subjects, rather than addressing them directly, and he was the master of leading slowly to whatever thought he was truly having - a skill as polite as his ability to bite back the sort of negativity that Thomas so often let loose. “It was terrible, you know,” Edward finally said. “Not the gas - before that. I wanted out.”

“Only madmen would want to stay in that hell.”

“Sometimes, I’d’ve given anything to be home.”

“Was it worth the trade?” Edward had gotten a rotten deal, of course, but there were those with worse, much worse. And there were those, so many, who were dead.

Edward wrinkled his forehead, thinking. “Most days, I’m really not sure. Some, I think not. Those are bad days.” He sighed and rubbed a finger along the scarred skin below one of his eyes. “I was having one of those this morning.”

“I know.”

“Yes, you do, don’t you? But what about you?”

“What about me?”

“Was it a fair trade. Your hand for home.”

It wasn’t a thing they talked about - none of this was. The trenches, their lives there, gunshots and shells full of gas. They spoke of the war but never of their own roles in it. Edward had not mentioned the wound on Thomas’s hand since he had found out about it in the hospital, so many months ago, when he had felt the difference between Thomas’s touches, between skin and leather.

“Yes,” Thomas said. “It brands me as what I am, a coward. But it got me out.”

“And into the hospital, working.”

“Yes. That, too.”

“I don’t care how you got it, you know. You were there a long time. You don’t make colonel for being a coward. And you do good work in those hospitals.”

“Hardly, I’m only a manager.”

“No,” Edward said, sharply. His hand darted out, his long, fair fingers wrapping around Thomas’s knee. “You’re not _only_ anything.” There was a pause; Thomas looked down at Edward’s hand. “I’m glad of it,” Edward continued. “Because it brought you to me. And you saved my life.”

Thomas said nothing, but touched the back of Edward’s hand, softly. After a moment Edward released him, and they moved slightly further apart.

“Does it hurt you, your hand?” Edward asked, after another pause. He’d broached the subject and wouldn’t back off, now that he had given himself the chance.

“Sometimes,” Thomas said. “Not as much, anymore. It aches in the cold and the damp.”

“So always,” Edward said, making Thomas laugh quietly.

“It’s not bothersome. What about you? Do you still have pain?” He always said he was fine, but of course that had been a lie, hadn’t it, and besides, Thomas knew very well that being fine wasn’t necessarily the same as not being in pain.

“Not like I did. The skin’s still sensitive, and my eyes sting sometimes. I get headaches, too, one doctor or another said it was from the strain the gas put on my sinuses, something to that effect.”

Thomas wanted to reach out and discover just which places were still giving him pain, to touch him softly and make it better. Edward wanted to take Thomas's hand in his and remove the glove, that barrier, and discover the wound, what it had done, how it hurt him. They sat quietly with their hands in their laps until Edward proposed a walk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry there was such a delay on this chapter, but I'm afraid this might be the case from now on, as my schoolwork is really picking up. I'll do my best to update as regularly as possible!
> 
> Edited very slightly on 10/16 to reflect Thomas's father's canonical occupation.


	5. Clouds Fade Above

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spring leads to summer; the heat grows, and so does their friendship.

Spring moved into summer with little change, and yet great change. The war wore on as though it might never end, as though it would continue to swallow up the men of the western world until there were none left to be sacrificed. But things changed on the smaller scale, at Downton Abbey, as their own were taken - or brought back, rather, but in such worse shape than before. William died and, alone in his attic bedroom, Thomas cried for him. He was the only man to come through the hospital that Thomas ever cried for - not because they had been friends, certainly not. But he nevertheless deserved a tear.

He visited Edward monthly without fail, and when he could he made it down twice in the month. Some of the visits were simple - idyllic, even, full of sunshine and talking, reading, walking, even laughing - most who knew Thomas at Downton may have been surprised by how Edward could make him chuckle and smile. Other visits were more complicated, however - harder - because Thomas could tell when Edward had been struggling, had been staying in his bed, not eating enough, fighting with his mother or worrying over his estate or his life, when his eyes were too red and his voice too low. And Edward could tell, too, when things were not fine with Thomas, when his sleep had been disturbed or his work difficult, when he was more taciturn than usual and slower to laugh. And in those times they would be quieter and softer with each other, but stranger, too, cold or motionless under touches to knees or shoulders, short with their words, until something broke in concern or annoyance and they could return to how they usually were, and go back to what they always did, because truly, besides those small shifts in moods, the visits remained as constant as all else.

This constancy did not mean, however, that each visit did not stand out in the men’s minds - each afternoon spent together held some moment they both grasped at, without ever speaking of it - some new piece of information or intimacy as they slowly came to know each other, as their friendship, like their stride when walking together, fell into an easy and familiar rhythm. They knew each other’s words and pauses, how Edward would dance around what he truly wanted to say or know, how Thomas would turn to short, reluctant words and fail to answer questions if there was something he did not want to say. And they knew each other’s touches, too - so important when they walked together, but present at other times as well - guiding hands, or sometimes curious. Edward’s life was newly lived through hands, through touch, and in a way Thomas’s was, too - ruled by a constant awareness of Edward’s hands, of the anticipation or observance of his touch, much in the way one might feel another’s eyes on one’s back, or look to see where their gaze moved and fell. 

 

On Thomas’s visits, good mood or bad, fair weather or foul, they did the same things - walked, and sat together. They wandered far through the fields and woods of the estate - Edward’s estate, Thomas reminded himself - and Thomas wondered at Edward’s knowledge of the land, his love for it. Thomas had never had such an attachment to a place. He had no love for the place he came from, for the back-to-backs of Leeds. He’d only ever wanted away from there. And he’d dreamt of Downton from the trenches, yes, but as an escape from, a foil to, the war. Edward, however, loved his home, and Thomas tried to know it, to love it, as well, and he enjoyed their time out on the land, soaking up the summer sun.

When they were inside, they read, but both there and outside, more than anything else, they simply talked - Edward was starved for conversation, and Thomas soon found that he felt that way, too, when he was away from Edward. It was a new sensation for him. He’d never been a talker or a great fan of talk. Mostly, they spoke of their shared world - about what they read that day in the paper or books, or what they encountered. Thomas learned how to speak of things he saw in a way Edward understood and enjoyed, his speeches as succinct and solid-voiced as ever, but with a poetry of description to it, a way of speaking opened only to the friend standing close, hand clasping his arm, listening to him like there was nothing else in the world. No one had ever listened to him like that before.

Conversation did veer, occasionally, into other matters, personal matters: Thomas’s annoyances at Downton, with the army and the staff, and the family, too; Edward’s frustrations, not with his infirmity - he rarely had anything to say on it - but with his mother and particularly his brother, away in France but constantly angling for control of everything, Edward included. Thomas hated the man, without ever having met him, not for his ambition - there was no fault in that - but for inflicting it upon Edward, who found it so hard to endure.

 

The only time that Edward spoke directly of his blindness or anything related to it in those months was on a late August afternoon, under the cooling shadow of the trees between the house and the fields. They were lying in a grassy spot, a space small enough that they almost had to touch in order to fit and not get their hair or trousers covered in the leaf litter and pine needles that carpeted most of the woods. They were both careful in how they lay, always so slightly at attention, and still. Sprawling and fidgeting was not either of their ways.

There had been a silence, so long Thomas thought Edward might have fallen asleep; he’d looked tired that day, as though he had not slept well, again. But then Edward spoke, his voice making Thomas start slightly, almost dropping his cigarette, while a finch that had been investigating the grass nearby took fright and flew away.

“You know,” Edward said, “I’ve no idea what you look like. All this time and I’ve never known.”

Thomas pushed himself up on his elbow. “I told you, I’m dark - black, straight hair, dark eyes. Pale skin.”

“Yes, but that’s hardly - does brown hair, blue eyes describe me?” He paused for a moment. “Are my eyes still blue?”

“No. And yes, they are.” Very blue, despite the remaining cloudiness, which only made them look more like the sky above them, through the trees.

Edward blinked and turned his head away briefly. When he turned back his expression had changed; he’d made a decision. Thomas knew the look. “May I touch you?” He was so polite, as though he were asking for the sugar at tea. “I mean to say, may I touch your face.”

Thomas nodded, but was silent for a moment, caught up in the request, the thought of it.

“Thomas?”

“Oh - yes. You may. Please.” He sat up, crossing his legs like a child and stubbing out his cigarette in the grass. Edward scrambled up and knelt in front of him.

“I’ve never done this before,” Edward said. “That is to say, I’ve touched people’s faces, but not like - not since -”

“Then y’won’t be able to tell how ugly I am,” Thomas replied. It made Edward smile, which, like always, made Thomas glad. “Here,” he said, as though he were impatient. Perhaps he was, in a way. He gently took Edward’s hands at the wrists and set them on his shoulders, near where his shirt collar ended. He was in his shirt-sleeves, on account of the summer heat, and Edward’s hands felt warm through the soft cotton - and yet somehow made his veins run cold for the briefest moment.

Edward shifted slightly, better aligning his body with Thomas’s, and moved one hand, then the other, to Thomas’s collar, then his neck. There, he stopped. “I don’t have to.”

“It doesn’t seem fair, my knowing what you look like, and your not knowing me.”

“I’ll never know what anyone looks like again, Thomas.”

“I’ll tell you.”

“Thank you, but it’s not the same.”

“No, it isn’t, is it.”

“And you’ve been a failure at describing yourself, besides.” His hands began moving again, and came up against Thomas’s jawline; that solid, hard form, bone so close under skin, became his anchor, and with increased confidence he moved on, his fingers only grazing so lightly over Thomas’s cheeks, nose, brow, the edge of his slightly mussed, sweat-damp hair, then back down again, to ears, the edge of cheekbones. Thomas, eyes closed, tries to imagine what Edward found - his too-heavy brow, the hard line of his lips, with a touch of age and so many frowns around them. He knew all his flaws, and he could feel Edward finding them until, very suddenly, he stopped, his fingers on Thomas’s cheeks.

"You never told me you have a scar," he said, his voice low, his thumb tracing the indentation below Thomas's left eye.

"Oh," Thomas said, almost raising his own fingers to touch it. He’d forgotten that detail. "I never think about it."

"It's not obvious, then."

"I presume not, you can only see it in the right light. No one mentions it."

"How did you get it?"

"My father."

Edward's eyebrows drew together. "Your father?"

"Him and a earthenware plate."

Edward's hand almost left Thomas's face as he drew back in surprise, but he came back, touched the mark again, gingerly this time, not exploring - wondering. "He hit you with a plate?"

"He did." it wasn't the worst thing he'd ever used, either, though he'd generally chosen his fists over any weapon.

"How old were you?"

"Ten, I think." Now he did raise his hand, the left, the leather of his glove brushing against his own skin and the tip of Edward's fingers."That's why it's such a funny shape, it stretched as I grew." He dropped his hand again.

"Good lord, Thomas." They'd never raised the reason Thomas did not speak of his family, but that seemed reason enough. Edward turned his head away, but his hands stayed there. They were never so invasive as words, questions.

"He was a good man, when he wasn’t drinking. And it's a long time ago," Thomas said, with a finality in his voice. He'd stopped letting that man hurt him so long ago that it seemed a story from another life. But there was something soothing there, in his voice - a knowledge that it hurt Edward more than him, talking about that. And a comfort in Edward's compassion, coming so long after the fact. "Go on then," he said. "But you'll not find anything else of note."

Edward did continue, for a moment, finding his way back to the edge of Thomas’s lips and his jaw, but then he pulled his hands back slowly, and folded them in his lap. “Thank you.”

“Not too horrifying, I hope?”

Edward laughed softly, and shook his head. “No.” He turned his face to the ground; when he turned it back to Thomas a moment later, he was smiling. “I think you’ve been keeping something from me.”

Thomas’s brow wrinkled, and he was glad Edward’s hands were not on his face anymore to know it. “Oh?”

“I think you’re likely very handsome, and you didn’t say.”

Thomas laughed, his face clearing in relief. “It’s not mine to say.”

“So you are?”

He laughed louder. “It’s not mine to say!”

Edward laughed, too, and got to his feet. “Come on then, let’s go back in, I want something cold to drink.”

Thomas stood, too, and held out his arm; Edward took it without pause, and they passed back out of their little bower and into the woods. As they walked, Thomas looked at Edward. He was glad Edward had asked to touch his face, though he also felt a small guilt that he had not even thought of it before. He forgot things like that, and always felt bad for it afterwards - but he had not even considered that Edward would so want to know what he looked like. He still wondered what he had found. But then he did often wonder what Edward truly made of him, how it was that Edward seemed to find so much to like in him when no one else did. They had been friends like this for a year, and sometimes Thomas wondered if it would last forever, these monthly afternoons of walking and talking. He certainly hoped so, but then he also know that nothing lasts forever, least of all things you want to never end. Eventually, it was always time for him to get on the bus back to Downton. Eventually, things would change. He had always liked change, before - it always seemed to bring new chances, new ambitions - but now he dreaded it, and though Thomas could not know it, Edward did, too. It was one of the things, among many, that kept both of them awake so long on so many nights.


	6. Set a Word in My Mouth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The end of the war is approaching, and with it comes change - and plans.

As 1918 advanced and autumn came to Yorkshire, trees turning their many colors, days going shorter, damper, colder, talk turned more and more to an ending, of the war really and truly running its course. It seemed only a question of time, with the Americans in it and bringing their New World power to bear on the Hun - the end of the war seemed in sight, seemed possible, where once it had seemed, to Thomas at least, that the fighting would never cease, not until the whole of Europe was lost in horror. But still, even with the end in sight, nothing was truly good. Downton was full of dread and sadness in a way it had not been before, even with the influx of the wounded. William’s death had been terrible, and Matthew Crawley’s injury left a pale of uncertainty over the house, though it concerned Thomas little. He had little sympathy for a man, even a wounded man, whose primary struggle in life was being loved by too many.

The impending end of the war did not leave Thomas and Edward’s small shared world untouched, and despite its glad tidings, it brought little joy to them. They had been brought together by war and they were bound by it; they eked some small comfort from their wartime lives together, and the end promised to change it all, and thereby induced more anxiety than either of them were willing to admit. If the war were to end, Edward’s brother would return home, and Thomas’s position of power at Downton would be lost; they would both be set adrift, and that prospect made even the anchor of each other, of their friendship, seem insecure. What would their life be, without its known qualities, the days set aside so carefully for companionship? It made them only worry, about themselves, about each other, about the small singular unit they had become, once a month, without fail. 

It was almost enough to make one wish it wouldn’t end, not that something like that could ever be said. And so, they did not speak of it for some time, even as everyone else’s minds and tongues filled with it, the prospect of an ending.

 

They were under the trees again; it had become a favorite place, and they kept coming back, even as the weather turned colder, until their fingers and toes went icy if they stayed there too long, until they couldn’t lie out flat anymore and instead sat cross-legged, damp and chill touching less of their bodies, pretending they didn’t each worry the other would catch cold, or ache too much afterwards. The peace and quiet of woods, the separation from the world, was worth it.

After some time of sitting quietly, head bowed, fingers picking at the dying autumn grass of the little clearing, Edward spoke, his voice somewhat hesitant, slow - he was thinking, Thomas knew the tone. “Winter’s coming.”

Thomas, already watching him out of the corner of his eye, nodded slowly. “I suppose.”

“They say it might all be over by Christmas.”

“They say that every year.”

"What will you do, after the war?"

"I don't know."

"You must have some plan."

Thomas looked up at the trees above him. He could think of nothing to say - he did not want to tell him about all the little ideas he’d had, ways to keep himself going when the war work was done. He knew Edward was not a man to share his schemes with, not those sort of schemes. He was too good, too inside the world where following rules got you somewhere, instead of keeping you down, powerless and afraid. “Not as such.”

"Do you think you'll go away?" Edward asked, finally turning to Thomas.

"I doubt it." Thomas turned to him, too, really looking at him, and frowning slightly. "Why all these questions?"

"I'm sorry, I don't mean to pry."

"You never do unless you've got a reason, stop being so polite."

Edward gave a twitch of a smile. He didn’t take offense from Thomas like some people did. "You've got me."

"Of course I do," Thomas answered back, but without a smile. He wanted to know what Edward was thinking, and drawing it out sometimes annoyed him - but Edward was still silent for a while. These people - Thomas had seen them do it at Downton, too. They danced around things, never wanted to speak of them directly. How long had it taken Edward to ask to touch his face? 

"Well, you see, I assume you'll not want to go back into service, you've ambition."

"I'll not be going back to being lackey to Carson and Grantham, that's for sure." 

Edward frowned; the statement had been rhetorical, Thomas understood that, but he'd wanted to answer back, had to. 

"For Christ's sake, just tell me what you're thinking, Edward, I've not got all day to tease it out of you." Another poor choice, a thing that didn't need to be said, especially not the way he said it. But it had its intended effect, even if it brought bad feeling along with it.

"God, Thomas! I just wanted to know if you'd ever consider coming here, being my man."

Another silence, stubborn or stunned depending on the party, fell over the two men. Leaves rustled and cattle lowed and they did not hear them, blood rushing in their ears drowned it all out, until Edward's voice broke the pause.

"I need a valet, a secretary - someone to look after me. You know I do, and you know I hate it. Hate it from anyone, anyone but you." And somewhere in there, continuation and answer overlapped in a mess of words, Thomas's "Of course" attempting to interrupt and failing; only when he paused again did Edward realize the other man had said something.

"What?"

"Of course, of course I'll do it. I'd love to." What a word to use there. But it was true. There was nothing he wanted more, but he did know, of course, how Edward hated needing help, even resented it from Thomas, on occasion. It had been an impossible thing to propose, an impossible thing to want.

"Truly? Don't humor me, Thomas, don't change on me when you're free of the war, I'll not be able to stand that."

"Don't be stupid," Thomas said, and he wrapped his hand around Edward's knee, that expression of sincerity they shared so often, better for communicating than their faces. "You have my word, Edward, when the war's done I'll be your man, as long as you don’t back out you've got yourself a deal."

Edward placed his hand over Thomas's, and squeezed. That was an extra, they didn't always do that, only sometimes, infrequently enough that it did hold some thrill. "All right, then. It's a deal." 

 

As the autumn drew onwards, at Downton the question of ‘what next?’ seemed truly askable, for the first time, and ask people did, and what a sweet, powerful, silent burst of joy Thomas got from being able to say he had plans, real plans, not some scheme but a position, an elevation of status, a new thing on the horizon - a future. No one had to know why his happiness was so sweet - being able to say he had plans was enough for him.

 

He didn’t announce it all at once, though; that wasn’t his way, and it was no one’s business. The staff and family of Downton had no right to know and the army did not care. He told O’Brien, though - she was the first to ask, midway through October, and he told her straight, that he was to be valet to Mister Edward Courtenay, of Rainedale near Harrogate, that he’d had it lined up for some time. That was a dig, and he knew it; it was why he’d put it that way, when truly it had only been several weeks. O’Brien would be put out that he hadn’t told her right off, and she was, though she was good - she hardly showed it.

“How’d you get that, then?” she asked, letting him light another cigarette for her although her eyes were shooting daggers at him, that or trying to burn in and learn it all without a word.

He shrugged. “He’s a friend.”

“Friends don’t have friends as their servants.”

Thomas blew out a long plume of smoke, purposefully watching it disperse into the foggy evening rather than meeting her eyes again. “Well, this one does.”

“And where did you make this friend?”

“In the war, how else?”

O’Brien considered him for a long moment; he still refused to so much as glance her way. “Here or over there?”

“In the village hospital.”

“Is that right?” Another of those pauses, the ones that said she knew exactly what she was going to say, but reserved the right to take her fine time in doing it. Thomas almost turned and walked away, but those pauses always did make you wonder what would follow them. “Is this that blind one that almost did himself in, then?”

He could’ve hit her for that, for her tone, if he’d been the sort - and she knew it. The cold sharpening of his shoulders, that mean glint in his eye as he finally looked at her, they said enough. “What of it?” 

Of course she’d heard about that - she heard everything, O’Brien did. Heard everything and kept it close, stored it away until it might be best used. More than a year and she’d not brought it up. But then why would she - she had no reason to know the significance of it.

“Oh,” she said. “I did wonder where you got off to, on your days off.” She’d asked, too, but had not been able to get anything out of him.

“I’ve said, away from here, isn’t that enough?”

“I do hope you’re not getting yourself into trouble, Thomas.”

He looked up at her sharply, almost shocked into defenselessness by the softening of her tone, but he recovered himself immediately. “I can take care of myself, thank you.” There were times he hated Sarah O’Brien more than anyone living on Earth, not for the meanness of her spirit, her creeping scheming ways, because he was many things, but a hypocrite was not one of them. So, it was not for those, but for her care. The fact that she felt his life was her business not because she always wanted to meddle, but because she loved him like her brothers, not so much but in the same way - and he itched under it, in those rare cases when she came to show it.

“So what’s in it for you, then?”

Thomas frowned at her. “How do you mean?”

“This new position, what’s in it for you?”

“It’s work, isn’t it? I’ll be needing it soon enough.”

“I thought you’d sworn off service. Not in a thousand years, you said.”

“Not here.”

“Not anywhere.”

“Not as a footman.”

“Oh, because being a valet in some minor house is so different. You could do so much better. You’ll be waiting at table, just you wait and see - when you’re not playing nursemaid, that is.”

“I’ll not be ‘playing nursemaid,’ he’s not an invalid.”

She only shrugged. “Well, I ask you again, what’s in it for you?”

“Why does anything have to be in it for me? Can’t I just want work?”

“No, you can’t. I know you, Thomas Barrow. You’ve never done a thing in your life that wasn’t in self-interest.”

“And I know you, Sarah O’Brien, and I saw how you looked after Mr. Lang - what was in that for you?”

“That was different.”

It was his turn to shrug, holding out his cigarette and tapping away the ash, watching the tip burn hot and red again. It wasn’t so different, not at all.

“You’re not just going off to help some poor soldier - I know you, that’s not in you. I’m not saying it’s bad, I just want to know what you’ve got planned.”

Thomas shook his head, turning back to her with a deeper frown. “Not a thing. And you don’t know me, O’Brien. Don’t say you do again.”

“And this blindman does?”

“Yes. He does.” Thomas was done; he stubbed out his smoke and went inside, shutting the door behind him with a definitive click.

 

It wasn’t until the last days of the war that anyone else knew of Thomas’s plans. When the new maid looked across the table and asked, so guilelessly, what his future plans might be, he told the gathered listeners how he would be leaving them and that long table, that servant’s hall, behind. “I’ve got myself a position,” he said, simply. Several eyebrows raised but he remained a china doll, no expression to meet theirs. “As a valet.”

“And how did you do that, without a reference?” Carson asked, as though Thomas had declared he’d crossed the Atlantic without a boat.

“War’s its own reference, Mr. Carson,” Thomas answered back, now with a quirk of his lips, almost one of his snake’s smiles. Being able to get around Carson, step up in the world without their lives having to intersect again, gave him particular pleasure.

Carson made one of his resounding, dismissive noises, announcing that his part in the conversation was at an end.

“Where is it, then?” Anna asked.

Not far enough from her and Mr. Bates, the soppy pair of them. “Outside Harrogate.”

“Ah, close, then,” Mrs. Hughes said, smiling at him, just a little. He never knew what to make of her; maybe she was glad for him. Maybe she was glad to have him gone. No one suggested he might visit.

“Who, may I ask, will you be serving?” Carson intoned; apparently he had decided to take an interest again. Concerned Thomas would be working for a rival family, no doubt.

“You may not ask,” Thomas replied, not bothering to rein in the curl of his lip, the sneer in his voice. “Seeing as I’m no longer in your employ, I can’t help but think it’s none of your concern.”

That was the end of it; Carson harrumphed mightily and no one would ask anything more after that, but went back to their small talk, their little ideas of life after the war. Thomas felt, for an instant, a spark as Mrs. Patmore spoke of the need for supplied, for hoarding - you could make a fine profit on a venture like that. But he’d leave some other poor slob to work that angle. As soon as he was dismissed, the hospital closed, he’d be gone from Downton, for good. He’d wanted to be back so desperately, in the war, but now he had somewhere so much better to go - and he’d never known anything like it before, the anticipation, the gladness, not just because his striving had got him somewhere, but because there was nowhere else he would want to be once he got there - no more striving. He would, quite possibly, be content, and he had never been that before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay again, the end of my semester is rapidly approaching - but I have six weeks off afterwards, and main goal for that time is getting this story wrapped up!


	7. Ye Who Seek Saving

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thomas arrives to begin his new position.

It was the end of November before Thomas left Downton, walking away from that grand house, bag in hand. He had found himself somewhat surprised by the well-wishes he’d received, by Mrs. Hughes’s warmth and even Carson’s gruff nod of farewell. Leaving could have even become melancholy, if it hadn’t been for his gladness about where he was going.

Coming to Edward’s house was slightly strange, however. Things were different, would be different, Thomas knew that well, and for the first time, he presented himself at the service entrance, rather than the front door, because while he finally had a valid reason to be there, and to stay, to finally stay, his standing had decreased. He was no longer an acting sergeant, he was a servant. At least he had managed to move from “Thomas” to “Mr. Barrow.” At least when Bland said it, he also shook his hand. 

Thomas did not even bother to settle in. He dropped his bag on the little metal bedstead - one attic room to another, no change there - and went downstairs. Edward was in the parlor, with Bland, who had only just come to tell him Thomas had arrived; Thomas’s knock interrupted Edward’s slightly strained “So then where is he?” When he heard the knock, though, he turned and smiled. “Thomas?”

“It is.”

Bland was frowning; Thomas ignored him, and crossed the room.

“You sneaked in,” Edward said.

“No -” Thomas looked around; Bland was just leaving. “I came to the service door.”

“Why?”

“I’m in service now, it’s my place.”

Edward only sighed.

“What?”

“I’m not sure I want it to be that way.”

“It is, though.”

“You’re not just my valet, though, you’re my secretary - my companion. You’re my companion.”

Thomas was quiet for a moment, looking at Edward. He was flushed, his eyes shining - upset.

“Officially, I’m your valet. Valets use the service door.”

“I don’t like it.“

“You have to get used to it - and to calling me Barrow, too. Otherwise, people will think out arrangement strange. You should have seen Bland frowning.” He’d meant to make Edward smile; it had not worked. 

“Why does it matter if they think it strange? You’re the one who says I shouldn’t care what others think about me, that I shouldn’t be afraid!”

Thomas fell silent again, for so long that Edward shifted uncomfortably. Thomas touched his knee, then, and they spoke at the same moment - “You’re right;” “I’m sorry.”

“No,” Edward said. “You’re right. Mother will object if we are too familiar. As will Bland. I’ll just have to adjust, Barrow.”

“I will too, sir.”

Edward laughed softly and Thomas pulled his hand back, letting out a low chuckle himself, though he was not terribly amused. It was somewhat awkward, their having to be so formal again; his entire arrival had been awkward. It was harder than he had expected. And he did not like how it seemed to upset Edward.

“Nothing’s changing, not truly,” Thomas reassured him. “Should we go for a walk?”

“Yes, let’s.” 

Edward stood up, then stopped, his head turning to the door, an alertness in his face that said he had heard something. Thomas turned, too, and found a woman standing there, watching them. It was Edward’s mother; he recognized her from photos around the house, though she looked older, and somewhat less grand, in person. Thomas stood up taller, back straightening to attention.

“Hello, Edward,” she said.

“Mother.”

“Is this your new man, then?”

“Yes, this is Mr. Barrow. Barrow, this is my mother.” The name did sound strange coming from Edward’s mouth after so many months without it, and Edward paused over it, making it seem to chafe.

Thomas gave her a small bow, almost a nod. “Ma’am.”

“Barrow,” she said, with a curt nod; that proper sort of greeting, both of them in their places. She then turned back to her son. “You didn’t tell me he was so handsome, or so grand, Edward.”

“Well, mother, I wouldn’t know.”

“Right, of course. Well, Mr. Barrow, I hope you are settling in, if you need anything, do let me know.”

“Thank you, ma’am.”

She turned to go, then spun back around with a swish of her heavy skirt. “Oh, and Edward, your brother will be home tonight.”

Thomas could see the sudden strain in Edward’s shoulders, the tightening of his hands. He kept his voice admirably even. “Oh? He’s early.”

“Yes, he managed to get away. Dinner at eight.” 

Then she was gone, and Edward deflated slightly. For a moment he just stood, head tilted slightly downwards, so self-contained, but not alone, not with Thomas standing by in silence, watching him. Then he straightened, and turned again to Thomas. “Shall we?”

 

It seemed, at first, that it would be one of their silent, moody walks; Edward was so obviously preoccupied, and if he was, Thomas was, too. Thomas had hardly known it, but now he realized he had wanted this to be a happy day - he had wanted excitement, a gladness that he was there, that everything was happening as it should be, and despite himself, despite his mental insistence that he should not expect such things, he was disappointed that that was not how the day had gone. But then, quite suddenly, Edward stopped, and laughed, holding Thomas’s arm tighter and squeezing his eyes shut in mirth. Thomas, bemused, stared at him in silence for a moment, then had to know what it was about.

“What?”

Edward let out a final chuckle and shook his head. “My mother.”

“What about her?”

“She’s taken a shine to you already. And you are such a liar.”

Thomas stiffened, though he tried not to, did not want Edward to feel that moment of discomfort through the movement of the tendons and muscles under his hand. “Oh?”

Again, Edward laughed. “She called you handsome. You said you weren’t.”

Thomas laughed, then, too. “I never said that, I said it was not mine to judge. You trust her?”

Edward shrugged. “I may choose to. You’re quite tall, they must have loved you as a footman.”

“I had my moments of popularity.”

Edward laughed again. “When you weren’t causing trouble.”

Thomas smiled, turning his head away slightly, then laughing at himself, for being demure when Edward could not see him doing it. “Exactly.” He took a step; Edward came with him, and they continued walking. He had told Edward stories, not the bad ones, not anything he feared would color the other man’s view of him, but the funny ones, about scrapes he got himself into, the more harmless pranks, the machinations of below-stairs politics. In the process he’d managed to make Edward see Bates as the bore he was, and Carson as the blustering, over-loyal overseer, so that was all well and good. And if Edward chose to poke fun at him for all of it, for his life before, all the better, because maybe that meant he did not care where Thomas had come from, or what he had been, in his past. Leeds, though, Edward did not joke about, and they rarely spoke of it, though Thomas had told Edward more about his childhood than he had told anyone else. Thomas found little amusement in that time of his life, and small changes of tone and short words and brief stories had been enough for Edward to learn that. He had not had to be told; he had to be told very little. Neither of them did, and they received what they were told like gifts.

After they had walked a little ways further, Edward spoke, not breaking stride, not wanting a long conversation - they usually paused for those, so they could concentrate on words and not on footing and route. “I am glad you’re here, Thomas.”

“As am I.”

 

Thomas made entirely sure, from his first day in Edward’s house, that it was clear to those downstairs just what he intended his position to be. The place had not played host to either a valet or a secretary in a long time, let alone one of duties as nebulous and essential as Thomas’s, but that only made it easier for him to take control. Starting the first day, it was he who dressed Edward for dinner, and saw to him afterwards, as was his place as valet. In the morning, it was he who collected the tray and took it up to Edward, and woke him for his breakfast by quietly going about his business, stoking the fire, pouring tea, opening the drapes. He was the one who had the happiness of seeing Edward turn over in bed and sigh and smile, and hearing him say his name like a question to the room - “Thomas?” - to which Thomas replied with a “Yes, sir, good morning,” that was somehow as warm as it was brief. That first day, Edward insisted he take a piece of toast, then sent him down to the kitchen for a spare teacup when he discovered he had not brought two. Edward did not like eating alone with Thomas waiting on him, where once they had eaten together, and he made it clear that he would not tolerate it, not in the privacy of his own rooms. So Thomas snuck a cup from the servant’s china, and stashed it in the wardrobe, and pretended not to know a thing about it when the cook finally noticed it was gone several days later. He would drink his tea as he selected Edward’s clothes for the day, and then shave him; after that Edward would dress, and their day would begin. 

In many ways, their days were the same as they had always been: they walked, and read, and talked, all in greater amounts, for longer times, than they had before. They had other things to do, too - correspondence and, increasingly, estate business - and they shared their days with other people, with more servants all around, and Edward taking luncheon and dinner with his family. Mostly, though, Edward and Thomas kept to themselves, and were allowed to do so, and things continued for them much as they had been, shifting through contrasting moments, of happiness and laughter, poking fun, long conversations, but then also of moments of annoyance, anxiety, unhappiness. Edward was somewhat unsettled, struggling to adjust even to the small and welcome change of having Thomas with him every day, and the less welcome change of having his family there, as well. Some mornings he did not seem to have slept well, and Thomas, too, found his new and rather drafty attic room a difficult place to sleep, not because it was uncomfortable - he was well used to sleeping in deeply uncomfortable, or discomforting, places - but because he sometimes felt he could feel Edward lying just as awake and unsettled a story below. 

There were moments, late at night, when Thomas thought about rising in the cold darkness of his chamber, dressing, and going downstairs, to see if Edward truly was also lying awake, but he was not about to be discovered sneaking about in the night. Big houses always had eyes, Downton had taught him that if it had taught him nothing else, and this place, too, seemed to be watching him, and Edward, and their time together - and some eyes were less kind than others. He would feel a gaze, and turn to discover Mrs. Courtenay peeking from a doorway as he fixed Edward’s coat before they went out walking, or Jack looking into a room as he walked past, pausing too long and watching as Thomas read Edward the news, or farm reports, or as they met with agents - meetings Jack asked to be included in, and which they neglected, two days in a row, to “remember” to tell him of. Mrs. Courtenay was a bit odd, maybe, warm and cold in the way mothers could be when they had had governesses to raise their children, but Jack was different, cold and suspicious in a way Thomas found sinister, and too familiar. 

 

It was Jack who, inevitably, became the problem, because he still wanted the estate, wanted power over the land - wanted, in fact, to sell up and move on. Edward, however, had decided to fight for his birthright, truly battle for it if he had to, with Thomas at his side looking for ways to bring down Jack, to dissuade him or find a chink in his pride and confidence, especially as he began to speak, so casually, so calmly, of raising a legal argument against Edward’s power over the estate. Thomas would have always argued for Edward’s ability to continue as head of the house and the land, but as he took dictation and sat by in meetings, as he was expected to do, listening and jotting down small notes, he found what he had already suspected to be entirely true: Edward knew the estate inside and out, and other than needing to have things read to him, described to him, he was an able manager of his family lands. In meetings Thomas always wrote down any little details he thought important, as though Edward might forget them, but Edward seemed rarely to forget much of anything about the estate. When dictating he could rattle off the names of farmers and their hired hands, numbers of sheep and harvest yields, faster than Thomas could get them down. He had ideas for the land, and Thomas read him trade reports about new farming methods, modernization; Edward was preparing to bring those ideas to his manager, priming him in little ways that said he could’ve been a politician as well as the lord of a manor, dropping hints and promises into the minds of those who mattered even while Jack increasingly postured, and complained, and began to look for any way to bring him down, trying to convince his mother - who hemmed and hawed and seemed distressingly on his side - while also facing off with Edward, and by extension with Thomas, and proving himself a worthy opponent for both Edward and Thomas: stubborn, stoney-faced, and alert to any weakness, and able to pick out the greatest one, Edward’s primary support, the thing he could not do without.

But in the end, Jack was wrong, because while Thomas - irreverent, jumped-up, taciturn, caring Thomas - might have seemed an easy target, and might have been Edward’s greatest support and greatest weakness, he and Edward were also each other’s strength, and attacks on them only made them all the stronger.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay, I suffered some writer's block on this chapter. I'm excited to finally have it up!


	8. Hearts Make All Plain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More change comes - for worse, and for better.

The real problems with Jack, beyond his complaining and saber-rattling, started less than a fortnight after Thomas had arrived, but it was Edward who started the first real conflict - and put it to rest.

It began one afternoon, when Edward and his family had been taking tea in the parlor; Thomas had used the time to get some mending done, but he was only halfway through the torn elbow of a tweed jacket he’d found stuffed into an obscure corner of Edward’s wardrobe when Bland appeared in the doorway of the small servant’s hall, and told him Mr. Courtenay wanted him. Thomas went up immediately, and, hearing the click of his heels stopping at the doorway, Edward waved him into the parlor, telling his mother and brother, “I have something to say which Mr. Barrow should also hear.” Thomas, coming to stand beside Edward’s chair, blinked down at him in mild confusion; he could feel the eyes of Mrs. Courtenay and Jack on him.

“I want Mr. Barrow to move downstairs,” Edward continued. “He can have my dressing room.”

Thomas stood very still, and felt a little annoyed that Edward would not be able to know just how straight he managed to keep his face. Edward had not told him about this little plan, but it sounded very nice to him.

“Oh?” Mrs. Courtenay said. “And why is that?”

“I find it inconvenient to not have him nearby.”

“Very well, I’ll have Bland see to it.”

“Mother,” Jack remonstrated. “It’s hardly proper. And besides, Edward, you survived many months without Mr. Barrow - and he can hardly be expected to interrupt his sleep as a result of your annoyance.”

There was a pause, and Edward turned to Thomas. “Barrow?”

“I wouldn’t mind it, sir. It’s my job, after all.”

“Edward -“

“Oh, do shut up, Jack,” Edward spat. “I don’t see why you feel the need to deny me everything I want or need, especially as it is absolutely none of your concern, and if you had forgotten, I am _blind_ , and in need of Mr. Barrow’s help.”

Jack stared at Edward with no small amount of shock before turning to their mother. “Mother -”

“Jack, if your brother needs Mr. Barrow nearby, I see absolutely no reason why he shouldn’t have him. I’ll have Bland see to it, Edward.”

“Thank you, Mother.” Edward stood up, and immediately found Thomas’s arm. “I think we’ll go for a walk.”

“Do bundle up, dear.”

“Of course, Mother.”

 

When they were out, walking across the lawn towards the near fields and the village beyond, Thomas let himself smile, and relax. “That was a handy bit of work,” he said.

“Well, Jack needs standing up to, you always say that.”

“Oh, yes, that was very well done. Didn’t see fit to tell me you were planning to move me, though, did you?”

Edward broke step slightly. “Do you not want to?”

Thomas stopped, and laid his free hand over Edward’s on his arm. “Of course I want to, I hate lying in that little attic room - are you often awake at night?”

“Yes.”

“I thought so. From now on, if you cannot sleep, I’ll be there. Not staying awake wondering, upstairs.”

“You lie awake too?”

“Yes. I’m not sure I would trust any man who does not.”

Edward nodded, and they set off again.

 

That night, Thomas slept in the dressing room for the first time, and before, he and Edward sat up late, reading, until Edward was finally nodding off. Thomas saw him off to bed and was there in the morning with his breakfast, feeling better rested than he had in some time despite having been up into the wee hours. His sleep was better when he was not so worried.

In the next days, however, it seemed Edward’s small rebellion had caused Jack to redouble his efforts, and his attention turned, to a much greater degree, to Thomas. He asked questions, taking more interest in Edward and Thomas’s friendship than seemed usual; in fact, it rang distinctly false. He never took an interest in his elder brother’s affairs unless he was trying to gain something for himself. When he found out Thomas had been hired without any application process or references - that Edward and Thomas were more friends than employer and employee - his interest seemed particularly piqued, but then nothing came of it, for a week, a fortnight, long enough Edward had forgotten the conversation. It was all brought painfully back, however, when his brother cleared his throat at dinner one night, and announced he did not see how Thomas could continue to be employed at their house.

“What?” Edward exclaimed, stiffening.

“Why, dear?” their mother asked.

“Well, I’ve been talking to Bland about it, and it seems Edward simply invited this man into our house without pursuing references, or any such usual ends to hiring a servant.”

“Well, yes, Jack, I knew that. They knew each other in the war.”

“You knew, Mother? Yet you never thought it seemed necessary to ask about his previous service? He wasn’t even a valet before the war, let alone a secretary - he was a _footman_. And, it seems, not particularly well-liked at his position before the war. Otherwise wouldn’t he have surely been hired as Lord Grantham’s valet, now that his previous valet has been sent to prison?”

“I don’t see what that had to do with anything,” Edward replied.

“Well,” Jack said, “The man I spoke to at Downton Abbey described Mr. Barrow as manipulative, a schemer - but I can hardly expect you to have judged him.”

Edward stood up suddenly, knocking over a wineglass and making the rest of the tableware clink and clatter.

“Oh!” his mother exclaimed. “Edward!”

“I will not put up with this,” he shot in the direction of his brother, “Mr. Barrow is my friend! And you talk as though I cannot think, cannot understand, just because I cannot see!” He turned, ignoring protestations from his mother, and rushed from the room, fumbling embarrassingly at the doorknob and running straight into Bland in the corridor.

“Mr. Courtenay!”

“I’m going up, Bland,” he managed. “I want Mr. Barrow.”

“Very well, sir, I’ll call him.”

 

Thomas had been picking at his own dinner in the servant’s hall - he’d convinced Bland and the cook to let him eat at the same time as the family did upstairs, because Edward often wanted to read or work on estate business as soon as he had finished dining. That day, though, Thomas hadn’t eaten much, because he felt something was afoot - a bit off, in the dynamic of the house - and he was preoccupied, trying to think of what it could be. When Bland entered and told him Edward had gone up and asked for him, he was on his feet and up the stairs in a minute, knowing something was wrong, his mind jumping straight to the flu though he very much did not want it to do so. He knew what had been happening other places, he’d read about the death tolls. 

When he knocked, he was answered by a slightly choked, confrontational “Who is it?”

“Barrow, sir.”

“Come,” Edward replied, much softer.

Thomas slipped in and found Edward pacing the room, frowning and rubbing at his eyes. “What is it, sir?”

“For goodness sake, no one’s here.”

“Then what is it, Edward?” Thomas asked, his voice tensing in response to Edward’s anger.

“Jack,” Edward replied, spitting his name out, letting it fall heavy into a short silence.

“What’s he done?” Thomas’s shoulders squared, ready to fight.

“He -” Edward turned and started to pace again, bumped into a bedpost, and let out a strangled noise, almost a shout. Thomas crossed the room to him, caught at his elbow.

“Sit down.”

Edward struggled out of his grasp. “No!”

“Stop it, Edward, sit down.” Thomas sat himself, and grabbed a hand to pull the other man down beside him with a thump of bedclothes and anger. “What’s he done?”

“He wants to get rid of you.”

“What?”

“He doesn’t like that you were hired without references and he’s been speaking to Downton Abbey -”

“What did they say? Did he speak to Carson?”

“I assume so - I don’t know, Thomas, he thinks I shouldn’t trust you. But he’s wrong. He doesn’t know you.”

Thomas sighed. “I wasn’t always as trustworthy as I could be, at Downton.”

“I know. I know you must’ve done worse than you told me, too. You’re ambitious, big houses are full on intrigue - but, are you happy to just be here, with me? It’s hardly a prestigious position.”

“I’ve told you, I don’t want to be anywhere else.”

“Jack really wants to be rid of you.”

“So? You stood up to him, didn’t you?”

“Of course. But if he gets it into his head -”

“I won’t let him send me away,” Thomas said. “He hasn’t the right and even if he had, I wouldn’t go.”

“But he’ll try -”

“He’ll try all sorts of things, Edward, he wants to get the better of you, make you a victim, you know that.”

“I know, but -”

“No buts. None of that. If you don’t let him, if _we_ don’t let him, he won’t succeed.”

Edward was silent for a long moment. He looked tired, sad, his shoulders slumping - eyes running, and not just from exhaustion. He was crying.

“Edward -” Thomas said quietly, moving towards him.

“Don’t you ever get scared?” Edward exclaimed, so suddenly it shocked Thomas, making him sit back. “Aren’t you ever sad, don’t you see how terrible this life is, how much it _hurts_? How are you always so _sure_?”

Thomas kissed him.

He didn’t mean to, he’d been trying not to - he wanted to just take Edward in his arms and hold him, he always did, wanted to make it all all right, and he always, always knew that wasn’t the answer, and kissing him certainly wasn’t, but he was upset and Edward was hurting and he hadn’t thought, not at all. Even if it did answer Edward’s question, exactly and succinctly, it wasn’t the answer he should’ve given. He pulled back quickly. “I - I’m -”

“I knew it,” Edward murmured.

“What?”

Edward caught at him, hand quickly finding his face, and then his lips his lips.

“Why didn’t you say something?” Thomas hissed, as soon as Edward pulled back, simultaneously as annoyed and as happy as he thought had ever been.

Edward’s small smile disappeared, making Thomas sorry. But he had to know. There had been so many times - and he had pulled back, so many times. Lain awake so many nights. “Because what if you weren’t, Thomas, what if I were wrong? Why didn’t you, for that matter?”

“I didn’t want you to hate me,” he replied, his voice low and slow.

“God, Thomas!” Edward pulled back slightly. “What kind of man do you think I am? Even if I weren’t… didn’t… I wouldn’t _hate_ you, never. You’ve been too good to me. You’re my only friend.”

“But that’s just it, isn’t it, it you weren’t, and then you didn’t want my friendship -”

Edward laughed softly. “It doesn’t matter anyway, does it, since you’re gone and done it now.”

“I have, haven’t I?” He laughed, then, and Edward did, too, and then they were both laughing, until they could hardly sit up, until tears ran down their cheeks - tears of mirth, for once. When they’d regained their breaths, almost, Edward moved towards Thomas, and Thomas wrapped his arms around him, holding him as tight as he had wanted to, so many times before.

“He’ll never take you from me,” Edward murmured, and Thomas smiled.

“Never.”


	9. Epilogue - Some Words of Our Story

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the end, all may be resolved - but not without a fight.

Thomas and Edward’s fight against Jack was, in the end, both protracted and sudden. It seemed Jack would not rest until he had control, though he did not have the right or the power to take it - but neither could he be fended off for good, it seemed, especially since their mother seemed so reluctant to take sides. So for every move Jack made towards taking what he wanted, harming them (not just Edward, but both of them, for they were together, two against one), Edward and Thomas pushed back, until they found themselves in some sort of stalemate, uneasy, neither party gaining ground, watching warily across the no man’s land of the household, the estate.

It was Edward who finally found the weakness, the chink in Jack’s defenses - he heard it, listening to the life of the house in a way no one else did, no one else needed to. Jack, unlike his elder brother, had never had much interest in news, or correspondence, but at some point since his return from the war, he had begun to rush to meet the postman every time he arrived. It was unusual and, therefore, worrying. “He’s up to something, I’m sure,” Edward told Thomas, “Corresponding with a barrister, something like that.” And so Thomas began to watch, and wait, and soon helpfully took over the task of greeting the postman and sorting the mail from Bland. Bland gave the job up willingly - it was simply another time he had to climb the stairs from his office, and he seemed to prefer to do that as little as possible - out of laziness or simple age, Thomas did not know, and did not much care. What mattered was that he now had access to the post, and could see what got Jack rushing to collect his letters.

Whatever it was, it hardly seemed noteworthy - they did not appear to be official letters, the work of solicitors or the like, but rather personal correspondence, in smaller envelopes and addressed with a neat hand. Jack was always there when the postman arrived, quick enough that even Thomas, with his thief’s hands, couldn’t give him the slip, and it was two months - three letters come and gone - before Thomas did arrive in Edward’s bedroom with one of those small white envelopes tucked away in his breast pocket.

Edward, sitting at the window, listening to birds or perhaps the harvesters in the fields, turned to him immediately. “I have one,” Thomas said, crossing the room. “One of his mysterious letters.” He pulled it out and waved it in the air, listening to the envelope crinkle - thin, bleached white. Not good quality like the stuff Edward liked him to use, ran his fingers over occasionally, remembering university, maybe, or the estate work he’d once done himself.

Edward stood up so suddenly the chair scraped out under him. “How? What does it say? Who is it from?”

“I slipped it away before he got to the post. I told you I would get one, eventually.” He looked it over. The exterior was unassuming. “From London, no name on the return address.” He slipped the envelope open, fingers careful on the cheap paper.

Edward stepped towards him. “What does it say?”

“Give me time, I’ve not even unfolded it yet.”

“Well, do it.”

Thomas almost laughed at him, at his eagerness, but the frown around Edward’s brow and the corners of his lips told him he shouldn’t. He did as he was told, instead, and read the first few lines silently.

“Well?” Edward snapped.

Thomas frowned. “I’ve hardly -”

“Tell me what it says.”

“All right, all right,” Thomas said, trying to keep down his own annoyance and calm Edward’s as well. “Sit.”

Edward did, finding his chair again and plopping down in it, but he only frowned harder. Thomas sat down across from him like they did so much, face-to-face at the window, so close their knees touched. Edward took a deep breath, and Thomas rustled the paper. Just one sheet.

“ _Mon chère -_ ”

Edward smiled, then. “Your accent is atrocious.”

“Well, I don’t have much call for French now, do I.”

“Have you ever?”

“Well yes, to ask for a drink or a smoke, or to lie and say everything will be all right.”

“Right. The war.”

“Right.”

“Is it all in French?”

“No. The rest’s in English, looks like. _All is well here, but we are not happy. James misses his father and I miss my husband_.” He stopped, and they raised their faces to each other.

“Husband?”

“So it seems.” They stayed silent for a moment, and still, until Edward shifted, their knees knocking together softly. “Shall I go on?” Thomas asked.

“Please.”

“ _I dream of when we can be together here - when can you be rid of that estate, please tell me. London is the place for us, you are right, but it is not right with you away. As always, because you always ask, yes, what you send is enough, but not enough to make us happy - but you know that, too. Please tell me you will be with us again soon, James is almost walking now and I wish for his first steps to be to his Papa. Your loving wife, Helene._ ”

Again, they were silent for a moment, absorbing this new information, grappling with how they might use it to their advantage.

“A wife,” Edward finally said, his voice quiet. “A son.”

“So it would seem. She doesn’t appear to be blackmailing him. Do you think he intends to acknowledge her?

“He’s certainly given no indication. Mother will be furious.”

“Will she?” She seemed to want marriages, grandchildren.

Edward nodded. “She doesn’t much care for the French. And for him to marry without permission - especially when she’s been trying to arrange an engagement for him - well, that will hardly please her.”

Thomas looked up from the letter. “She’s been trying to arrange a marriage for him?”

“Yes,” Edward said, as though it were no great matter. “Some daughter of a squire-turned-industrialist down around Sheffield - Jack’s more interested in the business prospects than the girl, I think, and this rather explains that… Mother has always had such clear ideas of what we’re to do, what we’re to be. Who we’re to marry. And now it seems we’ve both disappointed her.” He sighed and shifted. “So what are we two to do? Even if Mother will be displeased, this only gives him more leverage - having a family to support.”

Thomas shook his head slowly, still considering, but working it out. “Not if he’s keeping it a secret, especially from your mother - if he’s hiding something and we know what it is, then we have the power.” Again there was silence, and Thomas leaned forward, touched Edward’s knee, then kissed his head, lips in his soft curls. “Give me time. We can make something of this, I know we can.”

 

More than a fortnight passed before Thomas acted on what they had learned. Edward was impatient with the delay; he wanted something to be done immediately, wanted the strain of his brother’s pressures and machinations removed from his life as soon as possible. Thomas, however, knew from long experience that it was best to wait for an ideal moment before secrets were revealed, winning hands finally displayed after long being held to one’s chest. He and Edward came as close as they ever had to truly arguing in those intervening weeks - not just bickering, which they did all the time, even made a sport of, but actually disagreeing, sniping and frowning and sometimes falling into very uncompanionable silences, but always sorry, afterwards.

The moment finally came one late afternoon, after a long day of working on the farm business, and of Jack dropping incessant hints that he was seeking legal council, and would be looking further into Thomas’s background, as well. He was chafing as much as Edward, it seemed. Their impatience was a family trait. No one was in a good mood when the work for the day was done, and Edward went up alone, leaving Thomas to put away the day’s ledgers and letters. It was not an ideal situation - Edward going off by himself was never a good sign for his still delicate shifts of moods - but it did leave Thomas alone in the office near the front hall, door half-closed, working quietly and slowly, allowing Edward time to cool down. As he worked, he listened to Jack meet the postman, as usual, and then retreat upstairs – Thomas had begun to leave him to that task, now that he and Edward had what they wanted. A few minutes later, as Thomas straightened the last few things and swept his fingers along the edges of the room’s bookshelves, making a mental note to chide the housemaid about her dusting, Jack came back down, with the clatter of steps that Edward had pointed out meant his brother was on the warpath. The younger Courtenay was already shouting for Bland before he was off the stairs, but it was Thomas who met him in the hall, leaning impolitely in the doorway, unperturbed and thinking that he knew exactly what the problem must be. A letter received, saying another must have been lost in the post.

“Can I help you, sir?”

“Stand up when you speak to me!”

Thomas did, straightening to his footman’s posture, which let him loom several inches above Jack. “What seems to be the problem, sir?”

“Someone has lost my post. I’ll have Bland’s head for it, the old fool.”

“Oh? What post?”

“A letter, _not_ that it is any of your concern.”

The letter emerged then from the inner pocket of Thomas’s jacket, twitching slightly in his fingers like a thing half alive.

“You!”

“Yes. Perhaps you’d better come in.” Thomas stepped back from the door, slipping the letter back into his pocket.

“You had no right, I’ll have you sacked -”

“Again, sir, perhaps you’re better come in, before the noise brings anyone else and they hear what I have to say.”

Jack frowned, but he followed Thomas in and allowed him to close the door behind them. “You had no right to open my mail,” he began again. “I’ll have you dismissed. In fact, I’ll dismiss you myself, now.”

“You can’t, sir, your brother pays me out of his own pocket.” 

“Then I’ll have you arrested.”

“Have you considered that it might have been an accident, sir? I may have got it mixed in with the estate post, and not noticed until it was too late.”

“You’d never do that, you’re too damned thorough.”

“Thank you, sir,” Thomas said, letting a small smile tug at his lip, “But everyone makes mistakes.”

“Tell that to the magistrate.”

“I will. But not before I tell your mother, and the magistrate, for that matter, that you were being groomed for bigamy.”

“She’d never believe you.”

“Well, sir, I’m afraid the letter is rather conclusive proof.”

“Not if I get it off you, burn it.”

“Then you’d have no court case. Nor any reason to urge for my dismissal.”

“So, what, you’re blackmailing me?”

“I wouldn’t put it that way, sir,” Thomas said, soothing. “I simply want us to come to an understanding, which I believe will benefit everyone, in the end.”  
“And what understanding is that?”

“You will leave your brother and the estate be.”

“I can’t do that.”

“Why not?”

“Because this place will only hemorrhage money! If we sell, we can move on.”

Thomas clenched his fists. That was just the problem - Jack would move on, and his mother too, probably. But Edward had nowhere and nothing to move on to. This place was all he wanted, and all he had. Of course if Edward did have to go out into the world, Thomas would be beside him every step of the way, but it was all Thomas wanted to avoid that having to be so – to prevent Jack’s selfishness interfering with their lives, with Edward’s happiness, any more than it already had. “It’s your brother’s land,” he said, exerting some effort to keep his voice even. “And he does not want to move on.” 

“He’s hardly capable -”

“You know that’s a lie.”

For the first time, Jack stopped short, given pause, however briefly, by the dangerous, cold vein newly opened in Thomas’s voice. “Be that as it may,” he managed after a moment, “I’m not like my brother, I’m not happy to just be settled here.”

“No. You’re more like me.”

“Oh? How do you figure that?”

“You’re ambitious. Ruthless. Petty and plotting. You would make an excellent city man - a businessman. And you should. Make your wife happy, join her in London. Raise your son. Make your fortune. The place will be yours some day, anyway, or your son’s.”

“Not if Edward has children.”

“Somehow, I doubt that is a likely risk,” Thomas replied, voice and words carefully measured. They would both knew what he meant. Jack was many things, but he was not an idiot.

“Stranger things have happened.”

Yes, they surely had. An Oxbridge, country gentry officer and a coward of a slum-born footman had fallen in love, and they had saved each other, in their ways; and nothing would impede their happiness now, not if Thomas could help it. “It’s very simple, sir. Go. Leave your brother be - God knows he deserves it. Pursue the life you want in the City. Or, I’ll go to your mother, and your wife, and tell them about this little bigamous engagement scheme you’ve been running. If necessary, I will also tell the girl and her father. You’ll go from many prospects, to none. If you’re lucky, no one will try to arrest you.”

“I’m still of half a mind to arrest _you_.”

“And I’m still in possession of the letter. As well as a contact in the Parisian city office who has let me know that your marriage certificate is present and accounted for and very, very much legally binding. The boy’s birth certificate, too, with your name on it, under _père_.” The war had been good for some things, after all.

Jack was silent for a moment. When he replied, his voice was softer. “Where did my brother find you?”

“In the darkness.”

 

A quarter hour later, Thomas climbed the stairs to Edward’s room, triumphant, agreements made, letter still secure in his pocket. 

Edward was by the window, looking grumpy. “Where have you been?”

“You didn’t seem like you wanted company.”

“Well, I did. What kept you?”

“I’m sorry. I was talking to your brother.”

Edward snapped his head towards Thomas. “To Jack? Why? What about?”

Thomas came and sat down across from him. “About the letter, of course.”

That only deepened his frown. “Why didn’t you fetch me?”

“I didn’t want him to know you knew.”

“Why not?”

“Because then if it went wrong, I’d be the only one caught in the blast.”

Edward winced and Thomas was sorry, wishing he’d not used such a metaphor, but for once, he had read Edward wrong - that was not the problem at all. “Any blast that caught you would also hurt me, Thomas.”

Thomas was silent for a moment. “I know,” he said, his voice quiet. It was hard to remember that, sometimes - that he was an extension of someone else, now. That for the first time in his life, if something happened to him, someone else would care. “I’m sorry. Do you want to know what happened, then?”

Edward sat forward. In his petulance, he’d forgotten the most important matter at hand. “Of course. I’m sorry. Of course.”

Thomas smiled. “We had a chat, he and I. And I believe we’ve come to an agreement.”

Edward frowned again, but it was lighter. He sat forward farther. “Don’t draw it out. If I could find you to slap you, I would. What agreement?”

Thomas laughed softly and caught one of Edward’s hands in his own, stared down at it so he could concentrate on that, hold himself together for a moment longer. “He’ll go to the city. Leave you - us - be. With the understanding that the estate is your responsibility and if it runs into the ground, it will not be his problem. And that if it doesn’t, it will be his, or his son’s, to inherit.” He glanced up; Edward was smiling, just a little.

“How in the world did you manage that, Thomas?” he asked, his voice soft, wondering.

“I threatened to tell your mother about the wife and boy, that’s all.”

Edward laughed, then, his face cracking with a grin. “You’re a wonder, Thomas Barrow.”

Thomas laughed, too. “I wouldn’t say that.”

“Well, I would. Come here.” Edward leaned forward, and Thomas met him in the middle, and they kissed, soft, hands still clasped between them, smiles and the edges of happy laughs - from both of them - getting in the way only a little.

 

Thomas could say one thing for Jack, when all was said and done: he knew how to stop when he was ahead, how to take what was good for him, and accept it, not to linger, stubborn and begrudging. He couldn’t say the same for himself - but then, it had all turned out all right, in the end. It wasn’t long until Jack declared his intention to seek work in London, and within weeks he was gone, supposedly off to live a bachelor’s life and take a management position with a friend’s business. He’d be going home to Helene and little James, Thomas and Edward assumed - and they were right, because several months later there was a great to-do when Jack arrived for a holiday, wife and child in tow. Besides possibly Edward’s mother, all were happier, then; Edward got his estate, and was managing it well, and Jack got his life in the City, and Thomas got all he wanted, which was to be with Edward, and to see him happy. Even Mrs. Courtenay did eventually come around, because she had a grandchild, and soon another on the way, and they gave her a new way to occupy her time, and new things to worry over, and new excuses to be in London, instead of in the country - leaving Edward to his own devices, in what she called “the capable hands of Mr. Barrow.” And Thomas was capable, and Edward too, and left alone they lived a small life, walking and talking as they loved to do, and doing the work of the estate, and sitting in silence together, or reading, and at night intertwining or curling beside each other in Edward’s bed, together and in need of nothing else - love was enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My dear readers - I am so, so sorry this final chapter was so slow in coming. I have a whole slew of excuses to offer involving my schoolwork, a busy year, and what seems to have been a case of writer's block. Conclusions have never been my strong suit, and I was a little reluctant to wrap this story up and leave Thomas and Edward behind! I expect I may return to them some day.
> 
> Thank you so much for all your continued interest, kind comments, and encouraging words throughout both my active and sadly inactive months of work on this story. I appreciate them so much!


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